Decimated
by DreamingCynic
Summary: It began with whisperings across the Naka River of the clan with a fan for a symbol. Then a corpse with no eyes washed up on the Hyuuga bank of the Naka River. Sasuhina, slight AU
1. The Corpse on the Shore

**The Corpse on the Shore**

* * *

><p>The Naka River ebbed against the river bank, grey and sluggish. The reeds tethered to the shore were in a very sorry state –broken and torn from the fury of storm the night before. The little Hyuuga Heiress toddled amongst the reeds, her feet bare and stubbed. A furious pout formed up against her face in the belief that she could quell her tears with the compression and she sniffed loudly, but only because she knew nobody could hear. Her thoughts were not of the storm that had scared her the night before but rather, closer to home.<p>

Suddenly assessing that that simply sniffing was not sufficient to quell her tears, she staunchly stole a reed that was not broken and tore into it, uprooting it and rendering the stiff, slimy twig as a weapon. With this mighty reed, she beat the other reeds, suddenly aware that her father had underestimated her totally. Hinata lost his quiet derision in her daydream, imagining herself as a samurai princess, with ribbons in her long, flowing hair.

The dark humour played a sardonic twist upon Hinata's lips, and she spun around, knocking back reeds, and decapitating those that got too close. She swirled though motions beaten into her, jabbing and dodging and ducking and thoroughly destroying any reed that showed itself in her presence.

Tears suppressed, she stood back, her anger taken out on the plants. A smile played on her lips, knowing that she really shouldn't have done that, but she had and as of yet she hadn't been told off. She could start regretting it when someone told her off for it.

"I vow to grow my hair long. And wear pretty ribbons in it! And be beautiful!" she hissed to herself, suppressing those tears further and loosing herself into her daydream, the ribbons matching the inlay of her ornate kimono, the silver of her obi matching her beautiful and deadly katana.

She trundled along, waving her glorious reed around her as if she were a samurai caught in a bamboo forest of demons. The thought of the nine-tailed fox came to mind (After all, that was the demon all the adults all hated so much that they would only speak of it behind hands and in whispers) and she could practically feel the demon's villainous chakra (Orange and purple and red like blood) spilling over and into the area, it's hot breath, the puddles of drool that gathered around her feet. (The cold wet mud she was practically paddling in.)

The other demons had fled. It was her and him. Lowly (but beautiful) princess and cruel demon, the one-on-one showdown that everyone would recall and state how brave she was.

Demon blood stained her katana. She pondered whether to make her Kimono red (to match the blood she would be spilling) or white (just for dramatic effect).

She struck down another reed for good measure and twisted on the spot, eyeing the Naka River's sluggish movements for signs of betrayal. Her eyes caught something on the river bank, something large and unmoving, and Hinata eyed the object for a moment, supposing it was a log.

It could be the Kyuubi, trying to trick her with a Gen-jutsu so that she would fall into it's waiting mouth, crammed with sharp, ghastly teeth.

Or perhaps it was a crocodile. Once a time when Neji-nii-san had been nice to her he had told her that there were crocodiles in the Naka river. Or Alligators. Hinata couldn't remember which one was which, but she supposed it was the same difference. It might as well be the Kyuubi. All three had more sharp teeth than they ought to be entitled to.

She surveyed the object once again. It could be a crocodile she supposed. She gripped her stick tighter, feeling her palm go clammy and her reed shift in her hand. The object didn't move.

She crept through the reeds, her eyes fixated on the lump. It was long, and it was covered in the sludge of the river, a mottled brown. A twig snapped under her foot, and she gasped in panic. The object didn't move.

She ran at the object, battle cry forming in her mouth. She smacked the reed over it, the reed cracking halfway. Hinata opened her eyes, tears suddenly released by adrenaline and realised that the object was not a crocodile. Or an alligator. Or a log.

"Mister?" she asked the corpse, noting how long, or rather, how tall he was, his wet black hair, slicked and shiny with the river mire, and the symbol of a fan embroidered onto his sodden clothing.

She pressed her lips together and sniffed, wiping her tears away lest the man see her. That was the symbol of the clan who lived to the west of the river, whilst her family lived to the east. Hinata had always thought they must be bad people because they were talked of in the same way as the demon fox—whispers and rumours floated across the Naka River and settled like dust about the clan with black and red eyes.

In the thought that she had just assaulted an obviously ill member of the extended family, she glanced up and hastily searched amongst what could be seen of the family compound across the wide river—nothing much behind the canopy of dark pine trees, but none the less—their presence was suddenly far more conspicuous than she had ever felt before.

She turned to the cadaver. Her faithful reed was broken and the adults were going to be angry. She needed to know his face so that next time she met him, she could hunt him down and tell him off for tricking her like that. Or maybe ask if he was feeling better. Her father would like that assertion.

She pushed the body over, straining to lift the weight. The body rolled further down the bank, but eventually stopped when it met the water, his legs entangled in some reeds.

Hinata's face fell. She would be in real trouble should the adults find out how badly she had mistreated a visitor from another clan, especially one from the clan from the other side of the river. Especially one that appeared to be unconscious, or in a slumber. A shiver ran over her body, like a wet finger tracing her spine, and she didn't know what to make of it.

She approached the body. And observed. His face was too pale, and too blue for the man to be well, and he didn't seem to be breathing. In the depths of her mind Hinata pushed that thought away, and supposed that he was so ill that his breath must be shallow. His nose was blunt, like it had been broken, and his mouth long, as if it were smiling, taunting her with his lips. There was no rigour mortis. His skin had yet to develop the shade of green, of death incubated.

Were she older, she might have labelled this man as handsome, given the dimensions of his face, and the softness of his pale lips, but her mind gave that no thought as she intently stared at the man until his body was burnt into her retina.

His curly, wet hair covered his eyes and curiosity prickled at Hinata, and her trusty if not broken reed was close at hand. She moved the wet hair from his face with the reed. Hinata was too surprised to scream, but later, when the events had replayed over and over in her head, she supposed she would have never screamed.

She had come from a clan where the nightmare of their precious eyes being gouged out saturated their small family culture. Her nightmares derived of strangers hunting her down in a forest and stealing her eyes. Her night time tales often revolved around a Hyuuga hero that risked all to recover the precious eyes of his fallen comrades. Like all Hyuuga children, she had been taught the curse jutsu that would cause her eyes to self-destruct if captured by enemy nin. She knew what she was looking at, and that fear was so real to her she could identify it.

Where the man's eyes ought to be, there were only pits of blood and gore. A scent she had never smelt before—one that she recognised without knowing—of rotting, of death hit her and she recoiled, her face pulling into a scowl of disgust.

Then she vomited her meagre breakfast and began to panic .

She knew enough that the adults would be upset. Very upset. And angry. Very angry. She didn't want all that anger directed at her. She had enough of the percentage of her father's anger directed at her. She looked around and was aghast at how much of the reed bed she had ruined (the make-believe demons were forgotten in an instant). She was sure to be told off now, and it was all this man's fault. She looked at him, and some small, intrinsic part of her knew—had known from the moment she had spied him from afar—that he would never be getting up.

Tears rolling down her face, she pushed the man with her reed and her left foot, back into the Naka River and submerging him so he was pushed out of the river bank into the stronger tide of the river. She watched as the body floated, and then sank under the waves, perhaps never to rise again, wet and sodden with the murk and mire that dredged through the heart of Konoha.

* * *

><p>She was scolded of course, for the dirt on her clothes and her silliness in wandering into the dirty river, but the adults did not know of the destruction of the reeds, or of the man she had encountered, so she was sent to the bath-house in disgrace, and cleansed. She was more relieved than guilty.<p>

"How on earth did you get so dirty?" scowled her mother, white eyes narrowing in impatience. Hinata kept quiet for a moment, realising this wasn't a question her mother wanted to know the answer to, and that her large pregnant belly was making her irritable.

"I was playing, Mummy." Hinata squeaked, prising her lips from one another and quaking under her mother's quiet fury.

Her mother washed her hair almost callously, not bothering to mind the knots and tangles that hurt when she tugged on them. "And during this playing, how did you get these twigs in your hair? I hope you're not playing with that filthy Branch member."

Hinata shook head, not bothering to explain that Neji wanted nothing to do with her since he had received the marking marring his forehead, and was more apt to ignore her rather than play, like they used to.

"Can I touch your belly Mummy?" asked Hinata hopefully, brightening at the prospect. "I want to see how lump is getting on. Do you think they'll kick me this time?" In eagerness, she extended her hand, aiming for her mother's stomach, like a kunai to target.

Her mother swatted her hand away quickly, her fury not distracted. Hinata's mother often was pregnant, but Hinata never seemed to receive siblings, like other children did. Instead her mother seemed to inflate and deflate, her stomach rising and falling like a loaf of bread in the oven.

"Stop being so soppy Hinata, and get dressed! Hirumi. Look after her." With a waft of the scent of lily of the valley—a scent Hinata learnt to associate with constant and total disappointment, Hinata's mother disappeared, maybe to scold some branch member, or to make a fuss about a silly matter, or to perhaps to cry in her bedroom.

Like a salve to a burn, the branch member massaged the heiresses head, all too fond of the little girl. "You have to look special tonight, Hinata-sama." Cooed the branch member, who saw to Hinata's hair, slicking and sticking its fine short strands into a neat bob, before combing it through with a fine tooth comb, losing the lather and the bubble of the fragrant shampoo.

"Why so, Hirumi-san?" Asked the polite heiress, who addressed all her elders with respect, even if they were of lower status than her.

"There is to be a meeting, and Hinata-sama is expected to be there with her father, representing the clan. Your mother cannot attend."

There might have been a hint of some form of emotion, but despite noting its presence, Hinata couldn't quite understand.

"Is Mummy very unwell?" The little girl asked, suddenly struck by the thought that her mother could be ill, or could become horrible and still, like the man on the bank.

The Hyuuga woman stayed quiet for a moment there, tasting her words over in her mouth before she spoke them and taking the opportunity to take the small girl out of the bath and dry her.

"Sometimes having babies can be hard on a woman. Your mother isn't very unwell." The woman replied, petting down the girl's hair before helping her out of the bath and drying her down with a rough towel. She sounded unconvinced, but Hinata knew better than to test the waters any more than she had, and feared what would happen if her Father heard those questions.

She was sure she had earned more than a backhanding today, and as she was robed in a kimono almost befitting the samurai princess she envisioned herself to be, she resolved to put the incident behind her, and concentrate on her duty.

"Now. You must look like the best heiress the land of fire, Hinata, and bring pride to the family name," said the branch member as she fixed Hinata's ornamental obi, and attached an ornamental piece with jade attached. "There," said Hirumi "You look pretty tonight, Hinata-sama."

Hinata observed her little form in the mirror, and pouted, her eyebrows narrowing together and leaving a little crease on her forehead. "I must, if I am to represent the clan," said the little girl, with a grimness beyond her years.

* * *

><p>She was the only little one there, and she shrunk to her Father's side. It was scary how many clans there were in Kohona, and how many there were trapped together in the small meeting place, sharing glances and snarls, and how many smoked large pipes, leaving smoke hanging in the air to add to the sense of trepidation under the low ceiling.<p>

"What of the future of the clans?" cried out one man. They were loud too, and they all shouted, even her quiet Father, which shocked her greatly. She couldn't imagine herself shouting out to draw attention to herself in this cavern of wolves.

"Are those of _Kekkai Genkai_ families to be removed from Kohona?" shouted a leader of a clan Hinata couldn't identify.

"What of the monopoly of the _Kekkai Genkai_ families?" screamed a man from the back, shaking his fist.

Hinata realised that the mutterings and cries of approval were bad, for her father shook his head and hissed under his breath with ever comment, and her Uncle, her Father's advisor in all things civil, scowled deeply.

"Hear, hear! How is it possible for the smaller clans to compete against those larger, dominating families?" commented a blond man with piercing blue eyes. A woman to his side with dark, lank hair nodded her approval and added. "The promises and allure of the Kekkai Genkai displace mission givers from shinobi families without _Kekkai Genkai_, we also have to consider the land owned by these families- the land by the Naka is so valuable! It's fertile, arable land… And yet the compounds just sit there, doing nothing with it while we all have to buy in food from the outside! Kohona is starving!"

There was a cry of approval, and Hinata found herself shrunk to her father's side, overwhelmed by sound. "Yamanaka. Nara. Akimichi." her Uncle whispered in her father's ear. Hinata took it to believe that the Akimichi was the large man with light brown hair that kneeled by the blond man and grumpy woman.

"It is not our fault that customers prefer those families that have proven their worth time and time again," cried a brown haired man with black eyes, and that cursed fan embroidered on the breast of his Kimono. Hinata realised that he was the head of the clan from across the river. "Do you wish those of the _Kekkai Genkai_ families to become farmers! This land was given to us when we sided with the first Hokage… what we do with it is our own business. We have family to feed and house, and we have our own land to do so. We do not steal!" His comment was met with hissing, though Hinata's father cried his approval.

That accursed clan was their ally, Hinata realised with horror.

"Stay out of topics that don't concern you and patrol the streets, Uchiha," sneered a man from the front.

The Uchiha seethed, and Hinata quickly sourced that there was a young man sitting next to him, and his black eyes were like a magpies, calculating and quick. "What of Shisui?" cried the Uchiha head, a snarl on his face. The boy started, and Hinata read something on his face that she shouldn't be able to understand, but she could because she felt it too. Guilt. It was gone in a flicker.

_Shisui_. Even his name sounded like the lapping of the Naka River at the reed beds. Or around his body and she pushed it into the quagmire of the Naka River.

She blanched, and the boy from the Uchiha noted it. It seemed that his beady black eyes narrowed with new calculations and estimations, theories on the Hyuuga heiress and fabricated connections to his cousin. But his eyes lost interest, deflated in the moment, imagined as a fabrication of his mind, and the darkness, and the sheer impossibility of the little Hyuuga having anything to do with Shisui, alive or dead.

"It says something about the quality of our police if they cannot determine the fate of one of their own members," coolly commented the dark man who set himself by the grumpy woman from before. Nara, Hinata recalled, realising that the two wore the same clan symbol, and were wife and husband. Or related. Or both.

The Uchiha head hissed in response, his face flushing. The boy to his side frowned and stared rudely at the Nara.

"It's a hate crime!" howled the Uchiha head, pulling out his trump card and scowling ferociously for all to see.

Silence followed. Hinata did not understand. There was a muttering amongst the congregation. Her uncle Hizashi muttered something into her father's ear.

"_Kiri_." Hinata read from his lips.

She did not understand, but a tremor gripped her heart, and horror seized her with the uttering of those two syllables, a foreboding foretelling of the future.

"Father." Hinata pulled at her father's sleeve. Her father shifted his attention to her, and it was unsettling to see her father so pensive. "May I leave now?"

Hisashi nodded, and her uncle saw her out of the dark smoky room, away from the ugly, angry men, and away from the Uchiha with the fan embroidered on their Kimono.

* * *

><p>She heard it in bits and whispers, mainly amongst the unguarded branch house gossipers, but also amongst the adults that she was most concerned with, the elders, her father, and her uncle.<p>

"There was so much blood they've been unable to clear it all up. I hear the entire district is covered with brown smears!"

"The Uchiha heir- Itachi is his name. Beastly business."

"Only one survivor. He's Hinata-sama's age, the younger brother..."

But some whispers contradict others, and arguments blossom that trail down corridors and reach the heiresses ears.

"A fifteen year old? I don't care if he's ANBU, prodigy or not. Taking down an entire clan of trained Nin that are easily A and S class? Impossible!"

"It's a hate crime. A hate crime. They'll be coming for us next."

"We should evacuate whilst we still have the chance. It's madness to remain here."

And everywhere she went in the house, she heard the same word, again and again, until the mere sound of it seems meaningless as a collection of odd sounds sown together.

"_Kiri_." They say. "Remember what happened in _Kiri_."

* * *

><p>"Hinata," her Father orders her into his office, one day after her training has left her feeling weak and dizzy and she is still reeling with the amount of knowledge she is supposed to have absorbed.<p>

"Father," she bows respectfully, hoping that she isn't sweating too much from the training, and that she at least, looks respectable.

Her father places his palms on his desk, like he is contemplating a hard choice, and Hinata waits, her eyes lowered demurely.

"I think it will be best for you to attend the village academy, with your branch member counterparts. You have this weekend to prepare, then you will be attending the academy the week after."

Hinata's head bounces up, and she queries her Father with her eyes, amazed by this turn of events.

"I would prefer that you take all your tutelage under my own digression. But that is not a possible action. We need to make ourselves as harmless as possible. Try to socialise… just don't bring your peers home."

"I- um, Of course! T-this is unexpected, but I will try my best!" Hinata tried not to look too excited.

* * *

><p>Academy was disappointing. The village children were just as anti-clan as their parents, and that bias seemed to dredge down to them. Only the Uchiha survivor, who had captured the heart of his classmates, and no longer had ties to a proper, real clan anymore really seemed to be accepted by the village children.<p>

Even then, he seemed to abhor the attempts of the village children to make a friend (or a boyfriend) out of him. Instead, Hinata, with all her floundering, envied him from afar as she clumsily attempted to make friends with the distrusting village children, and failed miserably.

She tried to approach the Uchiha survivor one day after school, in the empty playground. He is a handsome boy, much alike to the boy at the meeting, but younger and varnished with the malady of angst, his calculating mind disrupted by the constant twangs of the heart.

"I'm sorry for your loss, Uchiha-sama," Hinata chirrups, head bowed in soft solace, and eyes squeezed shut, hands pressed together in a silent prayer.

His bleak eyes rack over her inferior quaking form.

"Fuck you," he snarls, leaving her to wonder what she did wrong.

She's still a little scared about the clan from over the river, about the dead body she disposed of, and those empty buildings that can be glimpsed from over the river- stagnating and rotting. But she's more scared about the termination of the Uchiha, and what that means for her own family.

She watches his retreating back shake in anger and wonders what will come of her family- those of pale eyes and cunning plans and gentle but deadly force, if their sister clan, the stronger, more oppressive, more influential family has been decimated to single figures.

"Uchiha-san?" She calls out in sudden inspiration, her heart suddenly beating, very, very fast and her eyes dewy with unshed tears. He refuses to turn, and he walks faster instead, walking away.

"WHAT HAPPENED IN _KIRI_? WHAT HAPPENED IN _KIRI_ UCHIHA-SAN?" She suddenly screams, her voice unrecognisable, the tremors and fears of her voice taken and snatched from her throat, thrown up into a vomit of a statement.

But the intent is there, and the fear, and the horror and the drainage of energy from night after sleepless night as the stalemate continues for another day.

He pauses for a moment and half-turns, his pale face draining of any colour, before swiftly turning away and shaking his head as if to shake his thoughts away. "If that's true then Hyuuga, then why?" He comments blithely, turning away again as if she is a liar.

Her mouth opens like a fish and he walks away. Hinata realises that he doesn't realise how they are hated. And that she doesn't have the heart to rebuke that belief.

She dawdles home, caught in an endless torrent of thoughts she can't help but feel are too adult, too clever, too scary for a little thing like her. When she enters the household, she finds that she has a sister, and that her mother is dead. Thus ends her stay in the academy.

* * *

><p>Hinata's Father burnt incense in his office, ever since Hinata's mother died. The branch member's tattle about his choice in incense – soft, woody, the same perfume Eriko used to wear when she was young, and wasn't married to Hinata's Father. Hinata simply doesn't like the heavy burning smell. It makes her sleepy, and this is the room that she must stay alert in at all time.<p>

"Hinata…chan. Come sit by me. Let me look at you."

Hinata falters, and then shuffles to her father, coming up to his desk and taking a place by his side, wondering where this sudden sentimentality has come from. She curses the incense for not reading this situation before it happened and the incense gets into her eyes. She begs them not to water.

"You're very beautiful, daughter," her Father praises, placing two fingers under her chin and twisting it, like one would examine a cabbage. Hinata is gobsmacked. "With time, you will grow into an elegant young woman. Like your Mother."

He adds the thought of her Mother like an afterthought, and Hinata understands why. The Clan needs to believe that their leader is in mourning, as they are. A family like this, where brothers and sisters can become wife and husband, that is so strongly intertwined, needs an official indication of what is acceptable, and what is not. Treachery is a dangerous undercurrent, and all the Hyuuga dabble in the rip-tides of politics.

His eyes meet hers. "I would try to marry you off, my Daughter. Join you to a clan with political strength. But you are too young for a feasible marriage and the period for that kind of attachment is long gone." He exhales into his paperwork. "Besides, no-one will take you. "

"Because I am of a Kekkai Genkai family?" Hinata asks. An arranged marriage does not surprise her. Her life is one of duty and protocol.

"Because you have cursed eyes. Because your Mother was your Father's first cousin. Yes."

Hinata flushes uncomfortably, and her treacherous eyes notice how old, and how haggard her Father has become. Her mother's death, the threat of extermination. The word of _Kiri_ on every other person's lips… Perhaps the end of this extensive waiting will be for the better.

"You know of the secret tunnels through the house?"

"Yes Sir."

"And the exit to the river Naka?"

"I do."

"When they attack, my Darling, I want you to escape from here. Escape, and swim down the river. Don't dare to take any more than ninja essentials, and trust your kinsmen to take care of themselves. Escape at the first opportunity. Stay close to the banks. It's ten miles down to the next fishing town. You can get to the mist then. _Kiri_ have had one civil war, one _Kekkai Genkai_ genocide. No one will expect you there. Hide your eyes. Live well. Survive. I may not be the warmest father. I doubt you have many fond memories of me. But I love you enough to tell you to run."

"Father… I…"

Hisashi placed a swift kiss on his kneeling daughter's forehead and patted her back awkwardly, not used to this kind of reassurance.

"I'm scared too. Take that terror and turn it into fury. Use it to forge your weapons and your hatred. Hone your skills. Love your loved ones. Strike down the ones that hate you… Avenge my death."

Hinata's breath caught in her throat. "Daddy." She chocked, winded and shocked. Her legs quaked, and her eyes welled with tears, incense or no incense.

Like an old man, he hunched over his desk for support. "Go now, and pack your emergency pack. Rest assured. I will die fighting. Now leave an old man to his musings."

Trembling with emotion, the girl who was so very nearly an genin bowed and walked from the room, her fingers nervously prancing in the anticipation of the task ahead of her.

* * *

><p>She lines up for her Genin Headband, and the others tie it around their heads, or waists. Knowing that she'll soon have to take it off, when she places it around her neck, it feels like a shackle, but she knows that all too soon, she'll be free of it.<p>

She's placed on a nice team. Kurenai, her sensei, is a woman of experience, and she seems more than happy to have a Hyuuga on her team. It's a case of good eyes, good close combat skills, good combination with her team-mates. The woman obviously doesn't play with shinobi politics.

Her teammates seem less than happy though- Shino, the enigmatic leader seems rather wary of her, though by the fifth D mission, he seems accustomed to her presence, having ascertained that she is no immediate threat. She would even ask him about his bugs, if he didn't seem so secretive about his family techniques and was a little less aloof, but she's afraid of making him clam up. If she had time, she would, but the deserted Uchiha compound seems to float into her line of vision more than she would like, and at certain venues, she's refused service. It makes her all the more certain that it'll happen soon.

Kiba is less certain. His though his dog has always liked her, and greets her with tail a wagging, Kiba scoops the puppy up and pulls it away, all too wary of her white eyes, and thoroughly freaked out when she does things that are second nature in her household, like catch things without turning her head or turn on byukugan without warning.

But a few weeks that turn into months of bowing and softly forming apologies leave him more than content with her presence, until finally-

"I'm so sorry, Kiba-san. I know that you really hate it whe-"

"Oh, leave it out. And call me Kiba-kun. We're teammates now. Hey. Shino! Let's all go to the beef joint down the food stalls. All the other teams meet up and have socials and damn it, I'll use any excuse to eat more beef!"

Akamaru barked. Hinata clapped her callused hands together and nodded with exaggerated motion, even though she wasn't fond of braised meat. Shino nodded slightly.

To them she left a letter, which she wrote and left in a marked Hyuuga satchel that was hidden in their training ground.

_Dear Kurenai-sensei, Kiba-kun, Akamaru-kun and Shino-san._

_Thank you very much for the kindness you extended to me over the period we were in a team together. I think I can say truthfully that it was one of the happiest times in my life, and I've enjoyed myself, even if they were silly little D- rank missions. I may be dead/a fugitive/ a prisoner/ MIA now (Remove as appropriate), but I think I can say that should things have not come to what they have, we would have made one of the best recon teams. I would have liked to get to know you better, and eaten more beef with you, and I can only wish that this dream was achievable. _

_I hope that our paths never cross. I never would want to fight you, and I hope you would return that feeling. I wish you the best of luck with your new comrade (presumably, I'll be replaced) and with your career as ninja. You show real potential, and I can only wish I was there to watch and grow with you._

_Best of Luck for the future, Hinata._

_Dare I send you a kiss? Yes. I think I do._

_x_

* * *

><p>The night before the attack, walking home from the training ground, her hands bloodied but her heart content, if not weary, she ran across an unexpected person. She'd written him off before, and she was surprised when he cut into her line of vision, his eyes flickering in suspicion.<p>

"Activate your byakugan" Sasuke ordered in a forced half whisper.

"Nobodies around" Whispered Hinata back, her heart fluttering in unexpected tremors as she scanned the immediate area. She remembered her place in the world, just as she had forgotten it, as if she were just a simple member of a team in a village that wasn't threatening to commit to genocide.

The boy didn't relax, just as all good ninjas shouldn't.

"You've thought about what I said?" the newly minted kunochi said, two years later, the incident still in her mind.

The boy standing in front of her had features so similar to that dead man, that corpse on the riverbed. She hadn't quite noticed, when they were still academy students, with peach soft features and puppy fat, but now, standing on the precipice of puberty, she could see the sleek bone structure, the same slant of the lips, the same eyes waiting to develop.

The shinobi tilted his head, and scowled in distaste. "I can see the truth in your words. What if it happens they are true?" He asked, like he was admitting a fatal flaw or an error he was responsible for.

"G-get ready to run. And run fast. My family will be next. Then it'll just be you to tidy up. Maybe they'll let you go. Maybe you were just lucky the first time round. Perhaps they'll keep you as a proof that the Kekkai Genkai clans were never killed off in Kohona. Whether you want to play political puppet is up to y-you. You could play their games if you want to- I guess," Hinata scanned his face, and was shocked that it seemed some part of him seemed to agree.

"Why is this happening?"

"We were always hated." The cursed words came out slicked and easy, and Sasuke's shoulders dropped down as if the burden he was carrying had trebled in weight.

Hinata's eyes raised themselves to the sky as she contemplated prose that would sooth the worries and fears of her heart. It was an impossible task, and her eyes found their path back to the black holes of Sasuke's eyes.

Unforgiving. Empty. Lonely. Destructive. There were a thousand negative adjectives to describe the intangible pull of those desolate eyes.

"People have always hated other people. They just need a justification. Blood. And power. If it wasn't us, it'll be somebody else."

They'd killed his family. They were probably going to kill hers in a matter of days, weeks or months.

His scowl deepened, and Hinata would have felt sorry for him, were she not more concerned by being seen with him and the possible consequences. Perhaps some guilt weighed on her chest, but it was little, and counter-balanced by the thought that she may have saved him.

"Thank you." Sasuke unexpectedly commented. "If you hadn't approached me…I might not have…I mean."

"It's okay," Hinata squeaked, blushing but worry wearying her smile thin. "I need to go. Good luck!" She waved him off, and tottered past him towards the relative safety of the compound.

She noted, that when he thought he couldn't see him (but she could) his hands shook despite all his efforts to quell their shaking. She wished him the best for a half-moment, then fled, making a note to herself that she really needed to fix up her bag of supplies and some of her sharpened shuriken in it.

* * *

><p>The explosion was to the west of the Hyuuga compound, from the direction of the abandoned Uchiha district. The time had come, and the Hyuuga heiress had envisioned this many, many times over, knowing that the day would come.<p>

She been planned since the day that she gained her Genin headband, and on presentation her father simply bowed his head and told her she shouldn't get too attached to it.

So she doesn't panic. She slips back into the servants' passage, and glides through them like a ghost, hearing fighting from beyond the walls. The clank of metal on metal is heard occasionally, but more often it is the screams and cries of her clan mates that are heard, and the dull sound that sharp metal makes when it meets flesh. Her lips form a hard line as she trudges onwards. They've known this was coming from when the Uchiha fell, so they should have prepared like her. Any attempt to save them puts her in danger, so she sticks to the shadows, her face slick with tears and her body trembling.

She hopes that her father has saved her sister. She's only little. She hopes Neji is safe too, because even though he hates her, he deserves more than death. She even thinks of Hirumi, who has cared for her like her own child. She daren't activate byakugan because she knows she'll not be able to continue down the servants passage, away from her clan.

In a secreted enclave she finds her survival kit, and she tears the note that reads _"Please don't remove, Thank you. Hinata" _from it. She limps down the passageways, the bag heavy on her back.

The guilt of leaving those who have ghosted down these hallways like strangers to their little heiress haunts her like a restless phantom. There are faces she desperately tries to remember, and forget at the same time, with the same dead-fish eyes and false (but _normal_ and _reassuring_) politician's smiles.

She meets fire on the second floor, and has to change her route, out of the relative safety of the passages and into the thin, claustrophobic, twisting branch house. The walls are narrow but the roof high, and the carpet covered in the blood of her extended (but in reality, all too close) family.

Their bodies have been removed, and Hinata is ashamed to say it, but she's relived, because that means that this floor has been cleared, and there ought to be no shinobi patrolling these floors. And the eyes of the dead won't follow her as she walks along timidly, her body light, but her feet lighter, their eyes judging her in death as they did in life.

She follows slicks of blood down corridors, from where bodies have been dragged. Eventually, streaks amalgamate and form consecutive flows down corridors filled with smoke, from a fire staged from deep within the house.

She reaches a door and activates her byakugan, the veins lacing her forehead jutting out with all the tenacity of wire.

She's close to the fort door that leads down the embankment to her beloved river, and the reed beds she's avoided since that fateful day when her safe childhood ended.

But outside are shinobi, three of them, grim faced but set—a job well done, and all in one night. She was twelve, and by the looks of them, they had a combined age of at least sixty. She sat in the shadows and waited patiently. Smoke filtered thinly from behind her from the bowels of the house, a fair distance away, and her little hiding hole was safe for the moment.

"Have you seen the bodies?" Asked the red haired man that looked to be the youngest of them. Hinata shook, and placed a hand to her mouth, acid of her empty stomach flooding up her throat.

A silver haired man, who wore a mask shook his head and pulled out a book, feigning interest in the cheap tawdry tales within.

"I didn't even know that there were so many! Just like rats, breeding and breeding. Good riddance I say." The red haired man shook his head. "Probably would have died out over the next few generations though. Inbreeding and that. Diseases in the blood. I hear the heiress is very weak."

"Have we got the heiress?" The final shinobi asked, a Kunochi wrapping her coat around herself more tightly, and resting her hands below her breasts in an attempt to stave off the chill that had entered the air.

"Probably with the other bodies. They'll all be burnt. Make it look like some kind of statement of intent from another country. I hear the Hokage wants to invade Ame."

"Ame? It's wet down there. I don't want to fight to invade a wet country!" the Kunochi protested.

"I could do with a good fight. I wanted to fight the leader, but I hear he gave a hell of a fight to some of the Root legion. They're organising and counting the bodies now. Probably harvesting. You know what Root is like."

Hinata made an internal note, for when it came to the time to avenge her father, as she had promised, prising her lips together in the hope that she would not whimper, or cry.

The Kunochi shivered. "I fucking hate Root. Fuckity fuck fuckers."

"What are you even doing here anyway?" The silver haired man raised his masked face and lazily perceived his comrades. "Weren't you two assigned to the main household ?"

The two other shinobi froze and nodded, sharing an expression of deception, and vanishing in the direction of the main household.

The lone shinobi sighed and pocketed his book, taking a generous look around the small opening. "You can come out now, small mouse," he called.

Hinata froze, not realising that she was detected. Unconsciously she met her hands to attempt to dispel a gen-jutsu. There were no fluctuations in the chakra field., and the man remained in position, suddenly laughing.

"You're as untrustworthy as my genin!" he suddenly sobered. "I don't blame you."

He looked side to side, acting as comically as he could in this situation. "I hear that there is a side door I'm supposed to be guarding. The funny thing is that it's a very small door, and you're a very small mouse. Should a small mouse like you creep out of the door, how is a shinobi like me supposed to know? I don't have eyes in the back of my head… like some."

Hinata took a deep breath. "H-how can I t-trust you?"

"You can't. You take chances. Thing is, I like to be able to look at myself in the mirror at the end of the day."

Hinata crept out of the door, and the shinobi spun on his heels and tucked his head in his book, comically pretending to be immersed.

"You're Sasuke's teacher." Hinata realised.

The man turned and blinked, though Hinata realised that he was winking, his hidden Sharingan spinning. "Another sweetheart? Sakura will be heartbroken."

Hinata shook her head. "He'll need help too Sir," she bowed. "Thank you Sir. I won't forget this."

The man turned back to his book, turning a page.

"I will. In fact I've already forgotten," were the words of the shinobi as Hinata fled for the secreted door, his words in her ears with the rush of adrenalin as Hinata fled for the secreted door, his words in her ears with the rush of adrenalin and the joy of being able to crunch the reed bed once more, rushing for the misty Naka river.

Never before had its slow and sluggish movements looked so inviting. Never before had the river sparkled under the moonlight, as if the stars were congratulating her for her accomplishment. Never before had she felt so alone.

She jumped, entering the mire of the Naka once more.

* * *

><p><span>Author's<span> note

Just edited for better grammar and greater relevance in later chapters. Chapter two is next, but I should really stop procrastinating and get down to some chemistry revision...


	2. Ignoring the wakeup call

**Ignoring the wake-up call**

* * *

><p>"Oh. Shibo," whined the small woman as the obese ferret waddled in front of her and proudly laid a slug at her feet. Hinata frowned and the ferret looked at her pointedly with a pained expression. With a grandiose humpf, the woman entered the small apartment flat, and allowed for the ferret to toddle in afterwards, leaving the slug outside.<p>

"That was the signal for you're being watched," the summoned ferret noted under his breath, sitting down and allowing his large tummy to envelop his back legs.

"Yes, yes, I did notice. I thought we had decided on a bird," Hinata fussed, allowing her eyes to wander around the apartment, itching to release her byakugan, and stare through the walls separating her from her potential captors. She slammed down her groceries and began to rush, kicking in the side cabinet under skirting and pulling out an apothecaries' satchel.

"The birds of Suna are rare and highly valued by the citizens, and normally used for carrying messages. I didn't particularly feel like bringing one down, as they are specifically trained for potential capture situations. It wouldn't do us any favours, if we get caught." Commented the nin-ferret.

Hinata eyed the ferret's belly, and the way that it settled over his feet, so the feet couldn't be seen. Shibo had always been a large bulky ferret, but ever since he had become Hinata's companion, he had only grown wider and more lazy. Wide in mouth and body, Shibo was a nice silky cream that mixed in well with the fur that often trimmed Hinata's clothing.

Hinata decided not to comment on the fact that he had managed to find a slug in Suna because he was too lazy to bring down a bird. "Are we going to stay?" asked the nin-ferret with hope.

"No," Hinata replied, gearing up and gathering her essentials, checking that her vials and elixirs were in order. She had settled down for far too long in Suna, and even with the precautions she had taken, it was inevitable that eventually somebody would be alerted to the woman.

The war had never spread to Suna, with the lack of any Kekkai Genkai clans, but hunters were in every city, looking for those shinobi that showed odd capabilities and strengths, and odd eye colours. Not all Kekkai Genkai were optical, but the most valuable and sought after tended to be. Suna was less likely to be targeted by those hunters, so it had been safer, for a while. The eyes of the cursed clans were very valuable to the right buyers, and with those from Kekkai Genkai clans in such short number, yet so much demand for their attributes, the prices people were willing to pay had skyrocketed.

Hinata was a very valuable commodity. Very, very rare, and very valuable. Or rather, her eyes were.

It was illegal, and a black market, but there was a sad oversight on the parts of the ninja forces to prohibit their own forces using illegal Kekkai Genkai. Hinata had always persevered by wearing contacts to prevent the sight of her classically augmented eyes.

"Crap," mouthed the ferret, who settled down on a kitchen chair. "Will there be running?"

"Possibly. I'll leave you behind if you can't keep up, though."

The ferret rolled it's eyes from behind her back at her empty threat, knowing fully well she would see every miniscule action, but then paused, detecting something Hinata couldn't. The ferret jumped up, nose in the air. Hinata froze in the middle of getting her specialist kit together.

"Shit. Don't activate your byakugan," the ferret hissed. "I smell a chakra sensor. They're circling now. Don't do anything."

Hinata paused. "If they're circling, don't they know I'm here already?"

"They could be seeing if it provokes you to do something. Stay low, kid."

Hinata fumed and left her clothing. She thought she had time, but it seemed like she didn't. The phials of specific antidotes were first, then poisons, canteens that slung low on her hips on specific bootlace belts with easy access pores that allowed the quick tainting of senbon needles.

Suddenly she turned, scanning her wardrobe, glancing inside, pulling out her trusty, if not battered, beige hoodie. She slipped it on, more than happy to feel the reassuring rustle of dried plant sample against her skin, like the caress of a lover, secreted in specific pockets. It didn't really matter which pocket they were in nowadays. She knew them all by touch, their leaves heavy into her skin.

"What are you doing?" screeched the ferret.

"Weapons." Hinata explained, pulling out several trusty and clean kunai from the front pouch. "If I can't go anywhere, I'll set a trap."

"We only know how to set traps with explosives!" the ferret yowled, tufted tail flickering.

Hinata shrugged and took out her tags, attaching them to certain kunai. "Can you still fit out of the bathroom window, or are you too large?" she asked sweetly.

To be fair, he had been too large when they had moved into the flat, but the ferret had stubbornly protested otherwise.

"I'll go for the kitchen window. No need to set up explosive there. It's Single glaze. I can break it."

"_With your hefty weight," _Hinata thought to herself, slipping a trip wire through the kunai and stationing the trap, centralising on the points of entry to the flat- windows, door, and pulling the wiring taught. The ferret caught her eyes and wandered over to her feet, out of the way.

A simple lattice covered the floor. Sixteen kunai aimed for the door, six at her bedroom window, five for the bathroom, each triggered with tags. It extended, covering the entirety of the flat floor, the only safe spot being Hinata's spot in the hallway, away from any points of entry, free from sight, a blind spot in a floor of explosives.

In her hand held the kunai that acted as the fail-safe- connected to all trap wires, should she release it, all the tags would go off, creating several simultaneous explosions about her. If she had done this correctly, the tags would blast away from her, distract, if not kill her pursuers, and leave her space to escape.

If not, she was dead- but at least they wouldn't hack open her face to get her eyes, which was always a plus.

"They've entered the building. Going for the lift." The ferret hissed, wound around her ankles.

"Are they hiding their chakra signature?"

"Yeah. They're all Jounins at least though. No Chunnin or under supresses their chakra that well."

Hinata's stomach plummeted deeper into her abdomen, and her breakfast curdled. "They're going for the kill?" she whispered, her voice trembling.

"Feels like it. They're all broiling for a fight. Let's give them one," the ferret hissed, squaring up his shoulders, and snarling.

The ferret was suicidal. It was the only reason it had decided to become Hinata's companion. Hinata felt the familiar acid reflux crawl up her throat and threaten to purge into the cavity of her mouth.

"They're in the lift."

Her mouth settled into a firm pressed line, as she forced her stomach to settle. Seconds became eternity. Her kitchen clock's tick-tock seconds became the countdown to a certain execution. Pulling up the kunai, she jabbed it into the wall, thumb and forefinger on the loose knot that would blow the flat to kingdom come.

She was going to miss the flat once she blew it up. She'd stayed long enough to actually gather personal effects, like her first pair of high heels, and a cheerful tablecloth. It was a pity it had to end like this.

"Closer."

Her arm ached with tension, but she refused to move a muscle, for a fear she would set the bomb off earlier than appropriate. The door loomed into her vision, her head just peaking around the corner, waiting for the first moment of the door.

She hadn't killed her Father's killer. Why hadn't she done that? She'd always been running, too busy in the schematics of staying alive than actually investigating the mysterious ROOT. Perhaps now was a wakeup call. There were things she needed to do, and priorities that she needed to set. Staying alive wasn't as important as dying with honour.

She had been running for a long, long time now. She was getting tired.

Around her ankles, the ferret furrowed his brow. "They're beneath us."

She looked down to the floor. The flat complex was a simple structure; the flat beneath her was exactly the same as hers above and the flat before. Each floor was identical, and she was on the top floor. "Below us."

He nodded to the door. "In the hallway. Downstairs. Your traps will work still. Less effective maybe."

"Yes." She looked even more alertly to the door. "Can you sense if any of them are Kekkai Genkai augmented?

"Maybe."

"Fuck." Hinata leant her weight even more heavily onto the kunai, and scanned the floor, having to restrain the want to uncover her blindness and see everything in detail.

"YOU'LL NEVER TAKE ME ALIVE!" Screamed a voice from downstairs, hoarse and desperate.

Hianta's mouth tightened as a scramble was heard below- close quarter fighting, metal on metal, a scream of some half-heard jutsu, and a rumble, presumably an ill placed earth style jutsu.

She sagged, hand still on kunai embedded in the wall.

"False alarm."

"False alarm." Agreed the ferret, sharing her relief.

A crack was heard to her left. A misguided shinobi jumped through her kitchen floor, seeking a respite from the antics of the floor beneath.

Hinata's eyes widened in the milliseconds it took for the debris to thrust from the Ninja's outstretched fist, and tangled, caught the wires holding her kunai to the walls. The Kunai ejected, smashing her window and catching the unguarded shinobi, a curdled scream hissing out of his lips.

Would it be fair, or right to consider that mangled body a cataclysm of blood, she briefly wondered. Her education had never once touched upon the abstract use of nouns. Then she remembered she had more pressing matters.

Her fingers clenched, then realised that the kunai had ejected, and that the failsafe knot that she had been holding had slipped out in the moment when the Shinobi had triggered the trap. The explosive tags were active.

She barely had the time to hold her hands to her eyes, and duck slightly as explosions that she had specifically engineered to blast away triggered. The sound was immense, and left her ears ringing, and her body quaking, She stood in a crater, the ceiling blown off, exposing the harsh desert sun, flat disintegrated around her, floor beams exposed, walls blown apart.

The unlucky Shinobi was nowhere to be seen.

"My-my tablecloths." She gasped a face full of blackened ash, spitting out her words through a newly split lip. Ash caught into her mouth and mixed with her saliva and blood, her mouth a quagmire of maroon and black.

"A Baptism of Blood," she spoke, feeling oddly poetic in the heat of the moment, with blood pooling in her mouth, her tongue desperately touching her teeth to make sure they were all still there.

She met Shibo's incredulous expression, but then noticed her hand, arm limp, slashed by the debris that had gone flying.

The ringing in her ears subsided somewhat, and her legs shook more, tremors racing up her legs. She sagged again onto her kunai, but the wall subsided, and she fell through the ceiling, landing on her wounded arm.

She choked back a scream, and scrabbled, flipping herself onto her back and raising her arm to her chest, ripping a dust covered towel from the floor and using the clean side to wrap her arm, all too aware that there was some form of debris stuck in her arm. She didn't dare to pull it out, for fear that the bleeding could intensify- the foreign object could be quelling the flow, and for all the pain that was blossoming up her arm like fire, she needed to escape.

The stole a few ragged breaths whilst she planned her escape. The Shinobi in this flat were not swarming around her- this was good. However, she could hear screams from outside, presumably from civilians. Bad. Shinobi would be swarming in a matter of minutes. She had no wish to get entangled with the Shinobi of Suna- she'd heard all she had wanted to about the three elites that were the forefront of Suna's defense.

In the past she had even aided Kankuro in specific poisons, though she had always pretended well that (as a civilian) her specialist subject was the interactions of opiates and specific nervous receptors- rather than toxins, toxins, and more toxins. Basically, her job was to develop a drug that was so strong that it would send the Kazekage Gaara into stupor, whilst suppressing the demon within him. It had been lucky chance she had even been allowed into Suna anyway.

Temari, she had never met.

She staggered up, elevating her injured limb and making the quick decision to take the easier route, ferret jumping down behind her.

"We're going to walk out." She hissed, biting her split lip to prevent extravagant contortions of her face.

"Walking sounds good." Shibo commented.

"We're going to get out." She heard a groaning from the other room. "If anyone asks, we're going to pretend we're going to the hospital. Gas explosion. Left the cooker on. Get out. Run. Good? Let's go."

She teetered on her feet, lurching like a drunk man, dust in her contacts, pushing open the door and ignoring her bloody handprint left on the door. The Shinobi had been struck down from above, and Hinata was relieved, if not annoyed to note that they were all chuunin. Her neighbour seemed to be hardly a threat. This had all been a massive overreaction.

If they had been coming for her- Jounin, or even ROOT, she wouldn't have had time. By the time Shibo would have detected them, she would be dead.

A sigh was caught back as she quickly stepped over the bodies like you would drunks at a party you had stayed too long at- or so Hinata supposed. Living as a full-time nomad hadn't done much for her social life, and even when she had found herself setting into life in Suna, she had curbed any social activity.

It was probably for the best, she supposed, making her way out into the hallway, and teetering down the stairs (The lift wasn't probably the best idea.) The fire alarm rung out around her, and she was caught up in a crowd much to her relief, though if she was as blackened by the dust as much as the ferret was, she certainly stood out more than needed. A snap of genjutsu quickly covered that up, disguising her in a puff of smoke to an elderly lady, slight stagger hidden within petticoats, twisted arm concealed under a hooded habit.

Shibo jumped under the dresses to her side, concealing his existence.

"Destination?" He asked, air hissing.

"Shanty town. Then Ame." Her arm was twinging more painfully with every step she took, and she wasn't one for wasting words.

* * *

><p>Suna, for a long time now, had been the destination of many refugees of the war, due to its neutrality and how welcoming the city was, or at least, initially. Though the lands around Suna were large, it had always been under populated due to the desert, and refugees with trades were warmly appreciated.<p>

However, carrying capacity now had exceeded the amount, and Suna was swamped with people, so much so that refugees were shortlisted before they could enter Suna. A thriving shanty town had camped outside the gates ever since the young, new Kazekage had decreed that no refugee was to enter unless they could be proved useful.

Her pockets jangled with the vials and bottles that she had managed to save, her jacket was stuffed with the plant samples she had had the luck to cultivate and grow whilst in Suna, despite the conditions.

Her leaving would be a great loss to the Suna toxicology department, but sure enough, with her apartment in flames, she was sure that her death could be contributed to the fight downstairs- an unlucky bystander, caught up an unlikely situation, not pursued. If anything, this might make it harder for anyone who was tracking her down. (However paranoid she was, she couldn't quite say that it wasn't plausible provided the Shinobi was a good tracker and had luck on his/her side. Shino and Kiba always sprung to mind.)

She tottered through the sea of human filth in the guise of an old lady, excrement in the dusty streets and rotting to high heavens. Swarms of children of all races purged through the houses, their fiddly little hands ready to swerve for your pocket, and the watchful eyes of the adults watching for those who walked as if they had money.

She passed the whorehouse, and resisted the urge to look at the women lounging outside, probably only just having woken up from the night before. It was bizarre how in the daylight the women were even more derelict than in night, the women lazing outside looked out of their comfort zones lounging in day dresses and slippers, painting their nails and sharing cigarettes. Their eyes slid to her, rolling in their deep set sockets.

"Piss off!" one called to her, curling her lips and snarling.

"Go suck a cock." Snarled Hinata, popping out of her illusion and flashing the finger, surprisingly vengeful in her bedraggled state, Shibo loped beside her with effortless grace, despite the ash that stuck to its fur.

The woman laughed grotesquely and called out "That's the business plan sweetheart!". But the women knew better to further irritate a shinobi, and they recognised her as one of their masters business associates, and knew better than to provoke her.

Even if she was pissed.

Hinata recoiled in disgust, but in her heart of hearts couldn't blame her, entering the whorehouse, holding her breath against the pain in her arm and the stench of unmade beds and all the substances that laid between the sheets, of sweaty men and the overindulgence of cheap perfumes. You could smell the husk, the sweet smelling opiate tickling your senses and calling out; ready to be smoked into oblivion.

She stomped to the "private" lounge, through a cheap bead entrance, where she was met with more women in various states of undress, male clients absent, lounging in scant underwear and slippers, resting their feet, smoking husk, cheap spirit bottles lying awry. Mirrors laid around the room, reflecting the smoke floating laconically as the opiate addicts lay on the floor, half asleep, drooling, eyes glazed over.

Like daggers of light her image touched upon the surface of the mirror, her reflection caught a thousand times over, reflected and caught between dirty mirrors and drug addled prostitutes, both tainted with age. Blood dribbled down her ashen skin, her face dirty and her eyes bland (but, safely, so in the best brown way). Her hair was a mess- frazzled and spiking, hair rebelling from its usual sleekness, and her clothing was the same, her hoody a bit musty and darkened, and only torn in one place, the bathroom mat holding her arm soaked with blood. The ferret had not fared much better.

She snarled at the more conscious women, not for a moment believing they were in any way intimidated and stomped on a trapdoor in the corner of the room, stomping down, one, two, pause, pause, three, every action caught by the mirrors and replicated perfectly.

"You can come down, if you really, really want to. I thought you'd refused to join in on my exploits, but then again, you are my favourite pharmacist." A voice coiled up from below.

"I said it would be a side-avenue. I had a good, steady job at the time churning out sleeping draughts for the Kazekage." Hinata replied, her grip on her arm getting tighter as she bent over and pulled the trapdoor up, feeling the soreness on her side and knowing there would be a bruise waiting for her when she had the fortitude to look in the mirror. She descended from the whorehouse to the basement, entering the first in a series of catacombs.

The poor of the shanty town were more than welcoming to a person who would be willing take rotting corpses off the street, no questions asked. There may have been more than its fair share of socio-economic problems, but the dead did not bother the poor on Suna Cheapside…

The trapdoor closed with the stomp of a resentful prostitute, and a secreting of dust.

"And now you want me? How delightful." Kabuto smiled, twitching his lips up as if they were tightened up with hooks, and flicking a bloody scalpel to his right, a body behind him, the odour of whoredom nicely covering up the underlying, rotting scent. "I'm so flattered."

"I need healing." Hinata sat down on the bottom two steps

"I gathered. How are you Shibo?"

"Not bad boss." The ferret grunted. Hinata rolled her eyes. The ferret was such a suck-up.

"So what can you offer me?" Kabuto asked, returning his unnerving glance back towards Hinata, glasses flashing.

"I've been working on sleeping draughts." Hinata replied.

Kabuto didn't look impressed.

"Powerful, powerful opiates. Stronger than Husk- more addictive too- less harmful."

"I get enough from dealing Husk."

"Relatively cheap to make."

"So is Husk."

Hinata pauses, desperation making her arm ache even more. "It's an ointment. It's absorbed over skin." She paused. "And I suppose I could make it into a suspension… a drink…"

Kabuto blinked.

Hinata had a flash of inspiration "Nobody would be on the lookout for it. It would be so easy to smuggle and transport." She decided not to mention that the drug itself was no more addictive than milk- perhaps a psychological addiction could be developed, but hard-core drug users? This drug was developed to get drug-users to get off harder opiates like husk by by-passing withdrawal symptoms.

She was screwing Kabuto over big time, but she could always plead that she had no idea, and it would take a long time for any drug addict to realise they were free from addiction (and quite by accident).

"Deal."

Hinata smiled, and held out her shaking arm, her hand more purple, and her fingers more swollen than she would like.

Kabuto winced mockingly, as if Hinata had the medical knowledge to heal herself, and should know better than to pester him. "Now that's a doozy."

* * *

><p>"Glorious Ame," Hinata muttered to the nin-ferret, standing on a cliff before the city.<p>

"It's wet," moaned the ferret. "And metallic."

Hinata clicked her tongue, a frankly annoying habit she had picked up from Kabuto. But she had to admit that the ferret was right. If it wasn't for the waterproofs, she would be soaked through. The rain fell with all the consistency of spray- not enough for heavy droplets, but nonetheless enough penetrate and saturate any substance. Shibo's cream fur stuck up, as if gelled, and his usually silky fur was coated with the brown mud. "Astute," she murmured, biting the corner of her healed lip and returning to the merchants trail, where the drug was being transported, concealed in gaudy looking tubes and transported by a few hired men, who had no idea that the cream they were transporting was soon to be the biggest drug earner in the land.

Before everyone realised that it was actually combating drug addiction.

Ame had recently been released, after having lost to Kohona, evidence of ever harbouring Kakkai Genkai reserves never found. Many Kohona Shinobi believed that under Ame, there were collections of eyes from different families, including the Uchiha and Hyuuga. A shiver ran up her spine. The truth was closer to home, or already implanted.

She had never come across a byakugan using Shinobi though. Either her family were less scarce than she had believed, or the eyes were being used as stock- experimented on, only given to those who needed them, and hidden. She believed the latter, though she supposed that should she ask, Kabuto could always enquire on her behalf.

She pushed that thought out of her head. She was valuable as a drug specialist, and a conversationalist upon medical related matters, but she had seen how his eyes widened and his aura brightened when a new specimen was brought in. She had no need to reveal, or hint her true identity to a person like him.

She trudged alongside the hired men, heavy boots sinking into mud churning up the mud. She looked the part of cheap hired muscle. Small, weak, alongside a cart of useless creams. Even in the bandit infested areas, nobody had bothered attacking. Poor merchants were not worth taking unless there was a specific hit out on a specific product.

They came across a roadblock, battered Shinobi guarding. They had to be Ame. Nobody outside could fake that downcast look of suppression, their tiredness, or their blatant, identical battle fatigue.

"What's in there?" One young man asked, the left side of his blandly handsome face mangled beyond recognition, lumps of muscles merged like curdled cake mixture, eye gone, hair scorched, ear shrunk like it knew it had no right to have survived where the rest of the face had disappeared.

Was it wrong that had his face been symmetrical, he would have held no interest for Hinata? A measure of yearning ran from her toes to her chest, coiling around her collarbones, and catching her breath. She faltered for too long.

"They're haemorrhoid relief ointments." She squeaked. "And suppositories." Very sexy she thought, despairing on the inside.

Spinster-dom awaited.

But the gates of Ame opened, no questions asked.

* * *

><p>She separated herself from the group of men, disbanded and left the creams in the dead drop, a corner in an abandoned warehouse facility. Frowning she peeled off the soaked waterproofed cloak and uncovered her new hoodie.<p>

It was tighter than her beige hoodie and she wasn't quite sure of where her plant specimens were in it, but the sleeves were longer, and the inner lining had proved easily adaptable to Hinata's needs. However, the purple colouring that she wore- a lighter lilac to indicate that she was one of Kabuto's workers wasn't quite to her taste- not that that mattered, but it was disconcerting to realise that Shibo could no longer curl up in her fluffy hood, long body tightly coiled, tufts of fur held by his tiny paws. She shook her head. Sentimental. Paired off with a baggy pair of black Suna Harem pants, handy canisters of easy access poison resting on hips, anecdotes within easy reach should she need them.

Her most extravagant elixirs also rested in her satchel that she slung over her shoulder, elixirs she had developed whilst in Kabuto's care, waiting for a test subject.

She cursed under her breath and turned to Shibo.

"You are dismissed. I need to do something myself. I'll summon you when I need you."

The ferret raised an ear, and poofed away.

She took out her contacts, brown and boring, and took them out, dropping them on the floor and stepping on them, looking around the warehouse with uncovered eyes. Why she had wanted to do this on her own she did not know, but perhaps, after all this time, she simply didn't like her eyes being seen. They were something to be hidden, to be concealed at pain of death.

Slowly she slipped in a new pair, her eyes not quite used to sight without a layer of plastic, watering slightly. Her new eyes were a pretty light pink, with large, wide pupils that made her look wide awake.

Uncharacteristically she pulled out a hand mirror and groomed herself, licking her fingers and brushing over her eyelashes, licking her lips, chewing on them slightly to increase the blood flow, and pinching her cheeks, hoping for a rush of redness. Her hair was long now, longer than it ought to be, but Hinata had no mind to tie ribbons in it or do any of the impractical styles she had envisioned when she was a child. She looked presentable. Her fringe was getting into her eyes, and she was paler and thinner than she ought to be. Her arm was still in bandages, but that wasn't important provided she didn't strain the stiches. Finally content, she put down the mirror.

She could almost say she looked attractive.

Hinata turned to the door and jumped. Ame was a city of layer upon layer, the poor living down on the floor and the richer living higher, looking down in a microcosm of society. Either way, the citizens were terrorised by the blandness of their surroundings, the swathes of grey intermingling with the spray of rain, neon lights glistening through the dredge.

She caught herself on the second level, the shinobi level, and found herself in the stalls, following the scent of food. There was weaponry being made, and flak jackets and shinobi shoes calling to her. Money that she had earned through helping out Kabuto and a little that she had salvaged from the flat jangled temptingly in her pocket.

Food first. The Ramen stall called to her more prominently than anything else- watery noodles in a thin broth seemed perfect for her starved stomach. She heeled herself up on a stool and ordered, enjoying the scent and watching people in her peripheral vision.

"I don't understand why we have to go to another damned barbecue," came a voice that echoed around Hinata's head prominently, like she ought to recognise it. "Don't you know I'm on a diet."

Out of the corner of her eye, Hinata caught the glimpse of a flash of brilliant blond hair trailing down a woman's back. Something stirred in her memory, like panic rising suddenly, without reason, nor cause nor motive.

Like the waves of a tide rising, rising and depositing it's depths onto the shore like so much bad rubbish. Like the random placing of a corpse on a child's path.

"Let's go for Ramen. We haven't gone out for ages with Naruto. Ought to be a good," a voice grunted, a deep bass not accustomed to over-use. She looked further to the right, and glimpsed the side of a giant, tall, large, imposing.

"What about my waistline!"

"What about your waistline? You should just do some training with Guy Sensei," a third voice teased, dark and intelligent. She couldn't see the man over the giant that stood at the very edge of her vision, and she didn't trust herself to turn.

"I'm game," the Giant concurred, rubbing his stomach. Hinata was reminded somewhat of Shibo.

They entered through the low lying entrance and walked in casually, bearing no mind to Hinata, who unconsciously leaned in, over her food, and began to eat, attempting to look as normal as possible, suspicious.

"Choji! Why do you tempt me so!" the girl squealed. Hinata was nearly sick.

Ino-Shika-Cho. Her Uncle whispering into her Father's ear. The blond girl who liked Sasuke, and would wait for him after school. The lazy boy who couldn't be bothered to fill in his tests. The chubby boy who always ate. The children who had shared Hinata's academy class. The kids with character ingrained, inherited from their fathers. Team Ten.

Would they recognise her? She resisted the urge to turn and instead stuffed herself more quickly, slipping the noodles more quickly into her mouth, feeling the uncomfortable protestations of her stomach as she bolted down her food. She had never been a big eater.

Her mouth tightened. If it were not for the misgivings of their parents, her family might have been saved. Had it not been for the families upset, perhaps Shisui would still be alive, living happily on the west bank of the Naka, not a victim of some hate crime, his body and bones still bound to his soul, his face handsomely wicked, like most Uchiha were.

The waitress took their order, and Hinata realised the proximity she had to their food. It wouldn't be hard for her to poison their food should she be given the chance. However, the food that they had ordered differed in texture of noodle and additions. It would do nothing if she only poisoned one of them, and left the other two to figure out what happened, and become suspicious.

The plates were balanced temptingly in front of her, for a moment of a second, which was all she needed, she was tempted to strike. She did nothing, and instead watched, and eavesdropped.

"I hate it here." Ino grumbled, tucking into her food, nit-picking, shifting through the noodles and eating the vegetables first. Hinata observed that the girl was now pretty to the point of ridicule. Blue eyes, blond hair and a body to die for. Seductress. Definitely, otherwise Kohona is squandering it's resources and Ino just likes bearing her midriff. Hinata supposes that had she the same body and the self-confidence the Yamanaka girl has evidently, she might do the same.

"We're doing a favour to Naruto. Can't be helped." Choji waved his used chopsticks close to Hinata's hair, and she flinched.

"Sorry." He grumbled, waving with his huge hand and waving her out of his mind. "It's a holiday anyhow. If they thought Sasuke was here Naruto and Sakura would be scouting. With Kakashi most likely. Maybe Shino and Kiba."

Hinata paused, happy to hear that there was another survivor, crossing her chopsticks like a good luck charm. She remembers the masked man, Kakashi, and despite herself, mumbles a prayer into her Ramen to wish him good health. She hasn't forgotten. Sometimes no news is the best type of news to have, but this feels like the best kind of news to have. Overheard, illicit in nature, but ultimately good- no deaths, only thriving. Eudemonia.

Shikamaru nodded and called the waitress, ordering a round of sake for his trio.

Hinata's eyes flash for a moment. In her left pocket there is a sample left over from her new drug- the opiate she has sold to Kabuto. It won't kill, but Team Ten will be out of it quite considerably out of it for a good couple of days, especially if they ingest the opiate. The opiate has no real taste- barely noticeable in water, if a little sweet, it would be unnoticeable in strong sake, and dissolvable, not inhibited by any of the ingredients in Sake.

Her eyes glint and she takes a straw from the dispensary and under the veil of her hair, slits it with a sharpened nail. She only needs a short length of straw to fashion a simple tool for administering the toxin, and it's all too easy to apply a small amount of the cream to the end, avoiding contact with the skin.

The Sake bottle and cups hover temptingly before her as the waitress walks past, not noticing when Hinata seizes the moment when the waitresses body intercepts any of the members of Team Ten's sight. A small globule of cream flies from Hinata's fashioned blowpipe, and like a spitball, catches on the side of the Sake bottle, almost sticking teasingly before tumbling in, only a condensation mark left on the mouth of the bottle.

Shinobi aim, Hyuuga eyesight. Hinata cheers herself on.

The Sake is poured, almost teasingly from the corner of Hinata's eye, slowly, as if Shikamaru is initiating some kind of tea ceremony, passing the cups around, slowly. She waits to see if he complains about a weird white gunk, or an unusual texture, but none arrives.

"Drinks up!" The three downed their individual drinks and in a ritual that Hinata was certain she was not to pertain to, each pulled out a cigarette and lit from the same battered lighter, smoking like chimneys.

She lays down her money and leaves, turning away from the team and onto the riveted metal station, hanging by metal girders from higher layers, pulling her hood up and hiding her face in shadow, only leaving her mouth visible, smirking just a little.

She's better to avoid the scene of the crime and suspicion now. They'll feel the effects of the opiate in a matter of minutes- just a slight moment of distortion, difficultly raising their eyelids, a stickiness of the mouth, trouble swallowing, and then a high followed by a rather enjoyable, albeit completely disorientating trip. Even Husk isn't as potent as this.

Revenge must be interesting. She really must consider the small matter of ROOT…

A bar glistens, and inwardly, she scolds herself- she should be on high alert now, not sleazing around the Ame bars in search of cheap spirits and a good time.

But it has been a long time now…

She bites her lip, and leaps upwards, onto a higher layer, away from team ten, and their glistening Kohona head protectors. Tonight is a night of escapism, rudely interrupted. She'll have to wander further from Ame to forget the threat of Team Ten, but there is some tenacious urge rebelling inside her.

Tonight will be her night, Team Ten incapacitated or not. She wants to celebrate her one-upmanship.

She has the sudden urge to call her drug "Trio", for its first, unwitting victims.

She's still on the Shinobi area, but higher up, in the more expensive bars where wannabe ninjas and gold-diggers search for adventure amongst half-geishas and the real human weapons with pent up frustration and money to loose. Love hotels exist only a side street away, heart shaped neon signs spluttering away as if in the throes of passion- or cardiac arrest.

A group of cowed Genin walk past, and Hinata has half a mind to tell them off, were they unlikely to die, which they aren't. In a way, she's no better than them- a voyeur in search of a night of excitement to break out of the mind-numbing tedium of paranoia- of living every day suspicious of everyone and everything. In the past she had wished her family a quicker end to save all the waiting. She realised the stupidity of that sentiment now. Living under pressure was one thing, but live too long under it, and life without couldn't be conceived.

A bar with a neon kunai and shuriken calls out to her and she stalks in, ordering from the menu of injury related cocktails.

"I'll have a muscle strain please." She orders, receiving and savouring the dark amber drink, attempting to not think of the chemical implications of this triple whammy of alcohol. She wonders how Team Ten must be feeling now- weather they are comatose or struggling to concentrate in the knowledge that they have been drugged, and are now panicking, attempting to analyse the situation (That is impossible due to their addled state, and after all, there is no situation to worry about, but they don't know that.). She feels an observer on the back of her head, and despite herself, she sits straighter, and crosses her legs, more feminine, more attractive than slouching over the bar.

Liquid courage has been absorbed, and she unhooks her hoodie and looks over the bar space, as if picking out meat from a butchers, finally resting on the eye, or rather, the eye that has been observing her from before.

It is the Shinobi from the roadblock- the one with the mangled face. The gaze piercing her back was with his one, good eye. With disgrace, his head drops to his drink, and he pretends to knock back his drink, some liquid escaping from a small hole in his upper cheek. He flushes and turns away, dabbing desperately at his ruined cheek.

Before his little accident Hinata is sure he would have had no problem attracting young ladies. The face that remains is still blandly handsome- sandy blond hair dripping into his green eye, a straight nose, a lip that must have once held a small curve to it, but now only holds desolation, and bitterness, and envy.

Finally, a man she can understand.

But there is no pity, only purpose as Hinata walks over and hands him a bar napkin, a come hither look in her eyes , and a smile evident. She feels sexy. He looks up at her as if she is a goddess. She is far from it, but she feels like it as she sits close to him- very close and asks him what drink he has.

"T-torn tendon…" He stutters, surprised by her sudden entrance. Hinata doubts that he is much used to female attention due to his sorry state of affairs.

She raises her hand and orders two more drinks, enjoying the attention spent on her. She wonders, how long has it been since he's felt female flesh on his own? How long has it been since whatever explosion took half his face with it? Is there more scarring on his body? A tremor runs down her body with the thought, and her smile becomes slightly more lecherous.

He speaks. She listens half-heartedly. He's from a fishing village, but his father was a ninja and the child attended academy here. He wants to return to the village. He talks about his dog, and his mother, and his little sister, and his dream boat, with a blue hull, and a spread of net for shrimping. He's boring, but under the lights of the bar, his face is all the more disfigured, and his sweat glistens his curdled features soft. She encourages his speech, and waits patiently, watching him watching her.

A silence falls, and he expects her to make a repetition of his speech- her dreams, her upbringing, the things she loves.

She does no such thing, and instead rests her hand on his, making note of the solidity of his hands, and the length of his fingers. That's supposed to be an indicator.

She smiles.

"Are you good in bed?" she asks, decidedly tipsy, but only because she has decided to play that way.

His mouth opens and closes like a fish out of water.

"I…"

"I hate to be forward- but I'm only in Ame for one night, and it would be a shame if I was disappointed." The question hangs in the air like perfume.

Hinata hates the double standard that arises. Does this man think she is a slut for approaching him, initiating a one-night stand? If she were a man, would she be lauded for confidence. How often is a man considered a whore for sharing his body with another? If a man sleeps around, it is to relieve stress, promiscuous behaviour is normal, good. A productive use of time. And yet, for a female, she is no better than a whore, a slut. After all, what is a woman's body but an extension of her Father or Husband's property?

Hinata hasn't to worry about either. Her body belongs to herself only, and her urges, and the methods she uses to suppress and satisfy those urges are hers to worry about.

"I'm better… than average." He replies his face flushing, modesty imminent.

He's a little more drunk than she is pretending to be. Like any other poison, and as a poisoner, she has a very high tolerance for any toxin that crosses her path. It's customary for her to down samples of toxin, taking her life in her hands if she has the wrong dosage. Over time, a resistance develops, and she is safe from yet another toxin. Alcohol, like any toxin, has been quenched as a threat to her sensibilities. She's even resistant to Trio.

And as a poisoner, she knows that one day, she'll most likely be killed by her own poisons one day, as a form of poetic irony.

She squeezes his hand and smiles gingerly. "I'll be the judge of that." She affirms, winking. "Is there a hotel of… notable disrepute around here?"

He nods like one of those nodding animal ornaments and staggers to his feet, pulling her up, his arm round her waist like a made conquest, pinching the side of her waist to assess her firmness. It was still raining, but ducking down and following the overhead pathways, they were able to avoid excessive rain. But her hair was getting moist and her face flushed, alcohol moving to the upper layer of skin for evaporation rather than affecting her brain.

She was far too sober. She cursed her tolerance.

"You'll enjoy this" He said, kneading her side softly, as if she was a mirage, a nymph(o) that would disappear at any moment.

"I'm sure I will" She mewed, manoeuvring him into a side alley that led to a promising love hotel, her judgement resting less on the flickering neon lights, and pressing him up against a wall, crashing his mouth against hers, and feeling the satisfying clack of teeth against teeth, of his half-mouth moving with hers, of his hands on her waist.

Lust in the rain, and all that jazz.

A movement sounded as a stranger entered the alleyway, and she relinquished the control, the shinobi's tongue extending against her lip, a tiny chunk missing from the top.

She turned to give a drunkenly disapproving look to the stranger just as the stranger unsheathed his katana, silver flickering like lightning and embedded it in her paramour's head, impaling it on the wall, blood spurting spasmodically as the Shinobi began to shake, nervous function suddenly lost as death initiated.

She didn't even know his name, but his fate was lost in a minute as she pulled out two ready kunai, prepared with an easy mix of Nightwort toxin, a powerful neurotoxin. It had taken at least seventeen cycles before she had retained some resistance, and she knew that it would not take long for any person contaminated to drop dread. Team Ten was lucky she never meant for them to feel the true brunt of their parent's warmongering.

Without thought, she shifted into the shoulders apart, knees bent, kunai readied, eyes activated, unholy tendons expanding, touching upon her temples, secreting her eye sockets with chakra like they had been itching to be fed.

Under the flickering of the love hotel's signs, their cursed eyes met.

* * *

><p><span>Author's note<span>

Thanks for reading! I've continued the theme of dystopia- save now Hinata is old enough, and world worn enough to understand the world around her with a devastating clarity. (almost cynical ;)) Think Hinata without the walls of the Hyuuga to protect her- she's had to survive somehow. I also wanted to note that I will be throwing words like Pharmacist, toxicologist, and poisoner around- basically Hinata's a drug expert- I've taken her canon talent for making ointments and made a plot leap... I also want to say that all the drugs I'm mentioning are not real, and neither are their side effects- you can't really have addiction free drugs that give you some kind of high.

For my lovely beta- (who has no idea what she has let herself into!) wingedmercury, I owe both my sexy grammatical prowess, and a ninja ferret, preferably on her birthday. (Thank you!)

I've stuck a poll up on my account page about the fate of Shibo (Hinata's furry companion) - If you feel like contributing go there! apologies for not updating sooner- I want to make each chapter substantial, and to do that, I need time- I think it's realistic to say that I'm more likely to complete if I give myself the time to make each chapter good.


	3. Not their finest hour

**Not their finest hour**

* * *

><p>Annoyance laced his lanky body, his Sharingan red eyes flashing with extreme displeasure, his mouth tightened into a straight frown, twitching with exasperation.<p>

"On the pull Hyuuga?" he spits the words out like she's his subordinate, drawling like a general, smile absent, lips limping into a slight snarl. He ponders on her family name to exaggerate the oxymoron that his statement is.

The possibility of a warm, heartfelt reunion, where a pleasant exchange of sentimentalities occurs, asymptotes to zero at that very moment.

"I-I…What are you wearing around your waist?" Hinata asks, kunai still held tight, wire coiled round the handle chafing into her skin, poison dripping tentatively. Her one night stand shook still, blood splatter on her new jacket' shoulder. She didn't move clear quick enough to avoid the initial spurts. The stutter shakes her for a moment—a sad reminder of the little child who strode along the River Naka like she owned it, who stuttered when nervous and scared, who was killed with the rest of her family.

Around Sasuke's waist is a coiled tarred rope, like those used on ships, attiring his traditional samurai guise like an ill-thought accessory. It would be insignificant, had it not been dyed a dark purple, and tied almost ornately. It's almost flamboyantly homosexual, in a quirky, almost indie way.

Sasuke's eyes alight to his waist as if he hadn't noticed he was wearing such an ornament and linger there for a moment, raising one pointed eyebrow with malice, dangerous sarcasm radiating from his aura like killing intent.

"That's Neither here nor there. You were supposed to be at the dead drop," he speaks calmly, his face injecting all the venom into the statement. The Sharingan spins slowly, and Hinata measures a second between consecutive rotations of tomoe. It's almost hypnotising.

"I was on the pull," Hinata replies, shrugging her shoulders into another basic position that leant her forearms closer to the canisters on her hips—more relaxed looking perhaps, but more angled, more decisive, kunai still clenched ready for a defensive maneuverer, presumably forcing him into a false sense of security.

"Team Ten was looking for you. They're currently indisposed," she stated, attempting to lull him into a false sense of security.

Sasuke shrugs and leans in, momentarily fazing Hinata whilst pulling out the sword with one, sharp action, frowning at the steel as if he hadn't realised that plunging a sword through a person's cranium wouldn't leave the sword bloodied with bobbles of grey matter. The body collapsed without the sword to pin it there, dribbling blood onto the dirty alley floor, still twitching slightly, the beautiful, normal side of his face staring up, sea green eye unfocused.

"I wasn't supposed to be at the dead drop," Hinata said icily. Even if he is the shadow of a ghost of her past, she cannot betray herself now. A boy then, but a stranger always, and strangers are never to be trusted.

Sasuke stared at her for an intermediate amount of time, and Hinata found herself matching his glare, biting the inside of her lip for strength—and pooling blood ready for a quick summon.

The man in front of her was right handed, and well versed in weapons, and much, much quicker than Hinata. He knew that too, and Hinata had no wish to pit herself against him. He was handsome too, and all too familiar in comparison to his dead relative. Sweeping cheekbones, masculine chin, jagged hair and battle hardened eyes. Lonesome as he might be, this young man was destructive, and motivated, and ambitious. A very potent and volatile mixture.

"Schuh," was the sound made from his lips as he broke the contact, raising his head to high heavens and rolling his eyes. "I'm surrounded by fucking idiots," he muttered, cursing his misfortune, and sighing, much like a disappointed teenager. "You were supposed to be at the dead drop."

"No, I really wasn't. What w-would you need me for?" her teeth relented from her lip, and her tongue probed, assessing the damage, tasting the blood, concluding there was enough for a quick summon of Shibo if she needed it. Her short range combat skills were no match to Sasuke's, and even if she did manage to poison him, he would have her dead before the toxin took effect.

Sasuke squinted at her.

"What i-is it?"

"Who are you working for?"

"Kabuto," her hands inched closer to her canteens, her eyes narrowing somewhat.

He raised his eyebrows, slowly & sardonically as possible. "And our favourite doctor hasn't told you anything about his master being in need of your…skills," he passed off Hinata's skills far too quickly, pausing to indicate their fallibility, sneering.

"Kabuto has no master," she squeaked back, baring her bloodied teeth for all it was worth

"Kabuto's research needs money, money that more often than not isn't paid back—how do you think he stays afloat?" He explained it to her like an impatient teacher speaks to a slow child.

"He's a motherfucking ninja." she spat, with little force.

"Kabuto works for Orochimaru, who is very impatient to meet you. Surprisingly enough, he's a motherfucking ninja too." He turned on his heel and practically goose-stepped out of the alleyway, expecting her to trail after him. He paused and tilted his head tauntingly, face pink by love hotel's flickering, a modern day Adonis, fallen amongst the mortals.

So very blandly beautiful in the most traditional way.

Hinata thought, and hedged her bets. She couldn't fight him. It would be foolish to run away. "How much?" she shouted after him, tailing, walking only where his feet had touched the ground, away from the cadaver whose last moments were forever Hinata's.

He shrugged, not even bothering to acknowledge her.

"I'm n-not doing i-it unl-unless I'm paid," she squeaked, nerves getting the better of her, faltering, her tongue twisting, her syllables tripping over one another.

"You get to keep your life if you shut the fuck up. He might pay you if you can find the cure for his ailment."

"I'm not a researcher."

"You're dandy with drugs, if I recall."

"Poison is more my thing."

"Poisoners are cowards." His voice reverberated, and grew in tempo and speed as he cursed her profession, her methods, and the damned lack of nobility, the lack of a creed, the underhand dealings & the general untrustworthiness of the profession.

He snarled, traipsing through innocent bystanders, extras in the "Tale of Hinata's disappointing night,"—now that would make a great "Icha Icha" Hinata mused, now all too familiar with Kakashi's rag of choice. Silently she vowed never to complain if her man of choice or night preformed abysmally- nothing could quite beat a beaux being struck through the head by a katana wielded by an angry Uchiha.

Sasuke was having a good old rant by now. "Give me a sword, and lets have it done. Simple and quick."

"I hear it's very messy. Hard to clean up."

He span on the spot, presumably aided by the wetness of the metal walkway, face as thunderous as a sky caught in the throes of a typhoon. "Was that a comment?"

Hinata flinched, realising her faux pas. The Uchiha were slaughtered by blade. Their blood covered the compound. She had heard from rumour and gossip that stagnated and become old over the Naka river as the Hyuuga realised that they were next, and that it was only a matter of time. Trust the Uchiha to be fussy about spilt blood when he's more than happy to stick his katana through another shinobi's head.

She raised her hands up in protestation, senbon needles hidden in her cuffs if she so needed them. "Poison doesn't leave any more mess than it ought to. Unless the victim… urinates or vomits… or defecates due to it—depends on the toxin! Ha-ha…But no excessive amounts of blood!" She's a little hysterical—the weight of the situation is going to her head, and she's waving her hands wildly, and not quite portraying her profession through rose tinted glasses, as Sasuke obviously does his.

She realises then, with a sinking of her heart that she's no better than the scum she's now so used to associating with.

Sasuke raises the corner of his lip and pulls a face in disgust, exposing his teeth, as she has so many times to whores and cripples and pimps.

"I had to survive somehow," she squeaks, dropping her head down, guilt dripping into her voice slightly.

"We all did," grunts Sasuke, walking quicker, perhaps in the hope that he'll loose her.

She stares at his back, glances that turn into stares as she imagines the patterns that her senbon could make if she was going to penetrate the man's back. Like a crazed acupuncturist, puncturing at whim, random until the needles made a cohesive pattern of their own accord.

Something clicks before her, and it takes Hinata a moment staring at the expanse of Sasuke's back to realise that Sasuke is trying to find words.

"I expected better of you," he says, his voice troubled. She doesn't quite get it.

"I…I-" She bit her lip, and felt it split where it had broken before, globules of blood entering her mouth. "I had to survive." What ought to be a simple admittance seems like a death sentence, a milestone weighted around her neck. "D-don't act as if you didn't. I once thought so, too. I was wrong."

"Che," was the sound Sasuke made in his throat, like coughing up phlegm. "A poisoner."

She gets it now. He's disappointed. Nobody has felt that way about her in a long, long time.

* * *

><p>"Your belt is to indicate you're Orochimaru's worker. Yes?" there's a pregnant pause as she wonders if this is correct statement- some kind of tautological truth she already ought to know, like knowing that a bachelor is an unmarried man- the statement is obvious in itself.<p>

"Yes," he replies, more interested in his bedroll than her attempt to make conversation. "And if you're wondering, he picked it out. Purple's his colour. You'll find that out soon enough."

He rustled more and tucked himself into his bedroll, rolling over, and falling into what looked like sleep, but could simply be feigned. Hinata couldn't blame him—she wouldn't fall into slumber unless sure of her surroundings, and in safe company—they were in neither.

She looked up, dark pine trees obscuring her vision. They were scouting around the Konoha border, and Hinata was on edge—Ame was close enough for her liking. Scouting around like this, haphazardly through the broken outer counties, up towards Orochimaru's base in Otogakure, which had been less affected by the war than others.

She had heard of the Sannin, and his experiments. He wasn't a character she wanted to tangle herself up with- in addition, Sasuke knew her identity as a Hyuuga. She could be walking into a baited trap. But she had been certain that Kabuto wasn't aware of her identity- and Sasuke had seemed far too angry when he had first met her—he had gone out to meet a lackey at a dead drop and bumped into a ghost from his past.

It could be an unlikely coincidence.

Her eyes wandered to her satchel, and she grabbed it, heart beating her mouth as she took out a small polythene cup (a preppy, cheerful green colour) and added the contents of several vials secreted in her coat, above her left breast. Resistance had to be maintained, and the only method was by downing the toxins regularly. She touched the coat's padding. Enough for two months, give or take, and samples enough to see her over for another two.

She swirled the venom in the cup, components mixing into one transparent liquid, looking no more toxic than water—it was always that way, Hinata supposed—the most toxic, most deadly, looking just as innocent as a glass of water. The mixture before her could kill Kages, entire legions of ANBU, Shinobi by the dozen.

She had never quite removed the fear that she had miscalculated—that there was a toxin in the bunch she was not accustomed to, that she had miscalculated drastically. Her hands trembled slightly and she pursed her lips, raising the cup and forcing her mouth open, gulping the liquids down in an instant, flinching when she felt the familiar burn down her throat, gulping and gasping. Riversnake venom had never agreed with her. She was going to have a bad stomach until it passed through her system.

"Propf," was the sound her lips made as she concentrated for a moment, mind cycling through side effects or indicators that she had taken the wrong amount, and weather the antidote was secreted away somewhere. She put away the cup after swirling a small amount of water inside it's rim, rotating by gyrating her hand, solemnly, like she had committed a great misdeed.

Her stomach rumbled.

Sasuke was a fool to call her a coward.

Satisfied, she rose to her feet and pounced towards the trees, up, branches whipping her face until she reached the canopy, settling, letting her chakra leech to the tree and hold her in place. The valley surrounded her, the dark pine tree forest reaching further, seeping over the valley hilltops like it never ended, enclosing her to its leafy bosom, like she would, and could never leave.

She activated her Byuakugan and waited for her guard duty to end.

* * *

><p>It was almost the end of the week were they set off, and they were close to the Hidden Waterfall- the pine trees eased out into untended fields of wheat, golden reeves standing taller and higher than they ought to be, abandoned farmhouses just visible over the surrounding overgrowth. It went without saying that this farming community is decimated by the war—fathers and brothers used for fighting fodder, wives, daughters, children and cripples swamping the cities in the hope they will be housed.<p>

"When did you escape?" Hinata asks, fidgeting with a seam that threatens to fray.

She was met with silence as Sasuke trudged on, his Shinobi sandals making imprints in the dust.

"Ano- Sas… Uchiha-san, I asked-"

He replied with a noncommittal grunt. Hinata recouped her thoughts and turned to the countryside, wallowing in the sunniness of the plains, and the sheer space- the flatness expanding towards the horizon. A bird of prey, a Merlin, circled above, as it had been for the last couple of days. She had been worried until she had realised it was a summon of Sasuke's playing scout.

Hinata turned away and played with the idea of asking him again, losing her vision to the gentle swaying of the wheat stalks, golden and shining. The sun beat down on her head. It was an enjoyable day, Playfully, she outstretched her hand, and waved her hand through the produce that would never be consumed, only wasted.

"Uchiha-san… How did you come to the employ of Orochimaru?"

"Hn," was the answer. She noticed that he walked with a slight—very slight—limp. Proof of overtraining and strain, or a morning ache, or maybe even a weakness? Sasuke's Achilles heel? She was speculating. There didn't even seem to be that much of a limp either, just a slight of movement concerning his limbs. His hair was brushed to his left. That only seemed to confirm that he preferred his right hand. If she could somehow paralyse the right side of his torso, he would be impaired enough… she looked to his left side and was distraught to find the same symmetrical pattern of veins and muscles, lean but potent.

She wasn't going to be able to run away from him. He was faster, stronger, and more agile, and would catch her almost instantly. She had to bide her time until he gave her the opportunity.

He didn't share his food, and he watched her diligently when preparing. She hadn't the opportunity to strike him down with one of her more potent serums (Trio seemed a little too blasé for a threat like Sasuke- it was time to pull out the big guns). She was certain that he could do more harm to her than she could do to him if she did attempt a head on attack. Normally, she relied on the element of surprise, and without it she was lost.

"What do you want with me, Uchiha-san?" How small her voice sounded. How sweet, and innocent and lost.

He sighed. "You would do well to stay quiet," he answered grimly.

His head jerked above, to the circling bird of prey. "We're being followed. Activate your Byakugan."

Hinata flustered, and ripped her seam open in the rush to open her ocular chakra pathways, having to use hand signs. "How long?"

"Two days."

She momentarily gawked at him, then deigned to "recover her cool" searching desperately with her byakugan until she caught sight of a four man team in the distance, lolloping after them at a gamely pace a few miles back.

"They know we know they're present. They are waiting for us to panic and do something stupid. Don't."

Hinata span to him, still watching their movements with her extended peripheral vision. "They're hunter nin!"

All four members wore the same Kiri hunter nin face mask, and all looked like characters Hinata had no wish to meet down a darkened alleyway- their chakra signatures were all powerful and individual- and that bode ill.

"Being a Ronin does have it's disadvantages," Sasuke replied.

Hinata flicked out several senbon and tainted the ends using her canisters. Riversnake venom killed almost on contact. She flicked her head towards Sasuke, fringe akimbo. "Are we going to run?" she demanded.

"Look again. They have a chakra sensor. So what do you think?"

She choked back a retort. By now the sensor would have had time to accustom to their chakra signal—it was hard to disguise chakra signature for a long time, and a powerful sensor could locate a chakra they had become accustomed to even if separated—the trail could reignite even if the fugitive thought they had gotten away. There was no alternative than attempting a head on collision. "What's the battle plan?"

"That you don't do something stupid." He twisted and walked backwards, sneer on his face. "It would be nice if you could attempt to prove me wrong."

Hinata reddened, until she felt movement on the edge of her sight.

"They're closing in." Sasuke raised his head to the Merlin circling ahead to confirm it, not taking her word at value.

Hinata turned, and watched as the ninja gained speed, ready to take the offensive, pounding down on her location. She turned around again. Sasuke was gone, and all that was left was an empty dirt track running through golden fields of wheat in the midst of a warm, happy day.

She turned back. The ninja were bearing down on her at an ungodly speed.

Sasuke was still nowhere to be seen.

She ran, feet bearing down the pathway, feet laden with chakra, kicking up sun-baked dirt in her wake, the instinct for self-survival more important than Sasuke's disappearance. She caught sight of the hawk levitating to the left of the track, and veered into the grain, movement restrained by crop, grain in her face, her hair, whipping against her body, and wrapping her, consuming her, till she felt like she couldn't breathe any more, till claustrophobia got the best of her and her hands trembled with adrenaline and fright. Her byakugan was blinded—too much information processed with the grains waving around her, and the migraine is dreadful. All she could do is look up to the sky, away from the field. It was a half measure.

She smashed into a low lying fence, too busy concentrating on the bloody summoned bird (she was wondering if Sasuke had just caught her in a cruel genjutsu and watching watching her run around in circles for his sadistic enjoyment) to notice a looming fence in her vicinity. She tumbled over, snarling curse words as she regained balance and whilst running, taps herself down, making sure none of her vials have smashed against her skin, checking that she still has her satchel by her side, still full. But her ankles were both bruised and running splints jolted up her legs with every desperate lurch through crop, broken reeds left in her wake.

She breaked out into an abandoned farmyard, the sun shining gaily on the shack's corrugated iron roof and stone brick, door hanging off its hinges, blackened and burnt, the tell-tale sign that an incendiary device having gone off in the house.

For a moment she humours a fools urge to hide in the abandoned shack, but continues running, faltering when she realises that in the surrounding cornfield, she is surrounded.

Three shinobi approach in triangle position, effectively blocking her exit.

Where is the fourth?

"Fuck," she swore, desperately searching for an opening. One is a woman, tall and willowy. Wind element user. Another, a man ripples with muscles every time he moves. An earth element user. The other misted through the crops like a tiny ghost, another earth element user, a small boy, barely taller than the average twelve year old. They're all using slight hinges that seem deliberately altered to confuse Kekai Genkai users—even with her byakugan she can't quite tell where they are, and she has no wish to waste her senbon.

"Tell us where the Uchiha is!" the boy cries out from under his mask, a childish voice delivering a childish statement.

Hinata catches sight of the bird flying over her, like a vulture circling. "I don't know!" she screeches. "He's taken me prisoner!"

"You haven't attempted to escape," cackles the woman, her voice horse and brittle.

Hinata loses hope that they will help her- they're going in for the kill. But they've been incautious. Hinata pinpoints her exact location. They're using slight illusions- minimal genjutsu that warp their actual location. It appears they are all to the left or right of where they stand. But they didn't bother to throw their voices, and Hinata's eyesight can sense a rat, the slight blurring of chakra, the replication.

Deftly, she spins, sending out senbon cutting through the cornfield. The shinobi all leap, but Hinata intercepts with another ream of senbon projecting into their pathway. It's a cheap, genin trick, but with random luck, the woman is hit, and before her comrades can react, she falls to a heap in the corn, her figure shaking and chocking until her body settles into a long death rattle, her only mistake being that a senbon needle struck her arm, and lanced across it.

It won't work again, and she's lost the element of surprise, but at least the numbers are down. Now the odds are two on her one.

And they're not going to go nicely on her.

The child lets rip an earth justu that makes the earth shake and crack, a chasm breaking under her feet before she leaps, just managing the corrugated roof of the shack, rusty iron promising to break through with one wrong move.

They move out of the overgrowth, the man flexing his muscles threateningly, the boy holding his fists so tight that knuckles are bleaching into white.

"I don't have anything to do with the Uchiha," she shrieked, taking a step back. The iron threatens to give out.

She leapt over the roof to the other side, onto the dust of the ground, as the shinobi pounce, the muscular one falling through the iron sheeting with a gratifying thump whilst the child catches up with her, his speed quicker than average for a earth user.

She spun, some last vestige of her training from when she was little retained and expelled, forcing chakra through her fingertips haphazardly, burning the pores of expulsion, but dragging her chakra down and over the child's torso. She blocked off as many as tenketsu as she could in a slap-dash, hardly permanent, forgotten to time way.

His arm grabbed hers and twisted violently, his foot sweeping under her to force her to flip over, her staggering half steps regaining balance as she leapt back, whipping her hand out of his reach and jumping back, preparing to pull out a kunai.

She leapt into the chest of the muscled man, who had moved deftly into her blind pot whilst the child had distracted her. His arms constricted around her body and no matter how many times she swatted desperately at his chakra points, his chakra points were so large her feeble injections couldn't block his pathways. His arms grew tighter and tighter, until she could hardly breathe let alone move, nor expel chakra into a foreign body.

Dark spots started to swim in her horizon, the child's hunter nin mask looming closer and closer, tension rising up in Hinata like lactic acid building up in oxygen starved muscles, cramping and aching all over.

"Tell us where the Uchiha is, mutant."

"I-I don't know"

The muscular man tightened his grip even further, squeezing without relent, until Hinata was certain he wouldn't stop until something cracked inside of her. Her view blackened even further.

A pain stole through her shoulder, a light cut digging into her shoulder, warm liquid that wasn't hers spraying over her as the pressure relented and the child gave a muffled half cry of desperation and anger.

She came to on the ground, face half in the dust, her head drunk dizzy from asphyxiation. She gulped down air as she pushed herself up on the corpse of the muscular man, removing herself from the blood in the dust, aware that the dust was in her hair, and blood all over her. Her shoulder was cut only shallowly. The man must have been cut through by Sasuke's blade, through the back, through the heart, just touching on Hinata's shoulder.

She looked up, crouching, hands on her knees in a safe squatting position, making sense of her surroundings. Sasuke and the child were fighting, the child wearied and bloodied, but moving quickly and keeping up with Sasuke, his earth element obviously acting as foil to Sasuke's lightning wind element.

There was a flash and a crack of lightning. Sasuke would win, but the child resisted the inevitable. Sasuke was playing, and the child knew it.

Hinata swallowed her saliva. This was a chance to run from Sasuke's clutches.

She leapt back into the cornfield, minding the fence, making straight for the horizon, sun beating through the rows of produce in a deluded halcyon daze. She hadn't any senbon needles left, and her chakra was spent, her muscles were aching, but adrenaline served it's purpose, her byakugan less blinded by the waving wheat around her.

She burst through the wheat onto the dust track, skidding to a stop.

She had no idea where she was going.

Left or right?

She chose left and sprinted not one hundred meters before feeling the burn up her legs, the exhaustion of the last couple of days suddenly getting to her—a combination of inactivity in Suna and lack of training, her legs feeling like jelly, her satchel flapping by her side, hands flapping as if she could pull herself along by doggy paddle, until finally, like she had been waiting for it, Sasuke's knee broke in-between her shoulder-blades.

She tripped and fell flat on her face, Sasuke on her back, obviously understanding with clear, cold clarity that she was attempting a half-thought escape.

She thrashed weakly, drooling into the dust, her eyelashes and features smeared with a fine layer of white gravel, Sasuke's weight bored down on her, crushing her body to the ground.

He grabbed her hair and twisted it back, forcing Hinata to screech like a demented banshee, tears running rivulets down her dirty face, back arching underneath his body as her scalp screamed , strands of hair lost to Sasuke's unrelenting fist.

In one lithe, quick motion, he slammed her face down. Pain lanced through her face like vespers of fire, death's bony fingers, scratching down her face in the same way as nails down a chalkboard. When she forced her eyes open, dizzy and disorientated, and watering like mad, she noticed the pool of blood, and the fact she couldn't breathe through her nose, and that blood was pooling and dripping down from her nose like a running faucet. Blood rushed to her face, and her hands shook in the soil, slowly raising, trembling to Sasuke's hands, clenching and pulling them off her hair, so that her hair fell about her like a veil- Sasuke couldn't see this weakness.

"I said not to do anything stupid," he hissed in her ear, anger barely contained. "You had to prove me correct."

With that, Hinata felt a strange awareness that she hadn't noticed as her face was consumed by agony- of a hardness, of Sasuke's groin pressed against her, his erection grinding against the small of her back.

He was aroused by this.

"H-hurk," she replied, spitting dribble and snot into the ground, gladdened when dark spots grew over the pool of blood, rippling with her breath. "Y-You…"

She retched, choking. "Y-You. Y-You. You sick f-fuck."

She was glad when the darkness overtook her, escorting her away from Sasuke.

* * *

><p>She woke up bound, woozy and shaking, her face numbed by an inexperienced healing jutsu.<p>

The climate was darker, the forest more dangerous than the golden plains where she had lost her consciousness. Nonetheless, Sasuke was oddly industrial as he cleared up after himself, in a domestic, run of the mill way, white hands cleaning his small food bowl as he perched atop a log, The smell of food—an instant sachet of rice perhaps- lingered in the air, and Hinata's stomach rumbled.

She watched in silence the way a beaten dog watches its owner, waiting for the moment where the owner drops his guard for one insignificant, fatal moment.

He'd taken her jacket off, and left her undershirt on. Her trousers too—they were still on, but the drugs and weapons that were contained in her harem pants were gone- and she kept her weapons of choice in very, very proximal conditions.

Experimentally, she flexed her abdominal and thoracic muscles, feeling her body from the inside out, projecting scenarios—if and where. There was no resistance to her stipulations, only a tenderness of a bruising under her ribs- where the muscled shinobi had squeezed. He hadn't attempted anything. She relaxed. She had enough problems without anything like that.

Sasuke, still unaware of her conscious state, turned and dug through his bag, eventually pulling out a small sowing kit, sterilising the needle and thread, and with a slight hiss of his breath, raised his trouser leg, piercing the ugly gash that had cut into his leg, systematically pulling the skin together with inexperience, his stiches large and messy.

"If you do it like that, you'll just get infected," Hinata informed him, eyes trained on his.

Sasuke shrugged. "I need to practise."

"I could have done it."

Sasuke glared at her for a moment before finishing off with a flourish, one good sticth to account for all the failures on the way.

"What happened to the fourth shinobi?" Three had attacked her. The fourth hadn't appeared close enough to be assessed, but in the distance, Hinata had definitely seen four.

"I killed two. You had the woman."

"I counted four in the distance."

"Then one got away by not entering the fight." Hinata was aware of the stipulations—she had clearly activated the byakugan. She had endangered herself. All she needed was for a Shinobi (& the leader of a hunter team) to report that an Uchiha and a Hyuuga were traveling together towards Orochimaru's base.

"We're two days off," he commented coolly. "I'm not going to unbind you. I don't want a repeat of what happened last time."

Hinata raised an eyebrow. "And what exactly did you do to me whilst I was asleep?"

Sasuke's face twisted into an expression of disgust. "I removed your weapons, your poisons and the weeds you had growing in your jacket. Rest assured, I'm not interested in you. In. Any. Way."

Hinata rolled her eyes like it was a common problem, and shut her mouth, if only to make this as awkward for you the young man in front of her—she wanted to see him squirm in silence.

He performed delightfully.

"How did you come to this?" Sasuke asked, provoked by the stifling silence.

"Why should I tell you?"

Sasuke sighed wistfully and grasped his katana, sticking it to the hollow of her neck, below her larynx and closer to her carotid artery than she would like. He was impatient.

Hinata scowled. "I went up to Kiri. Struggled on my own for a while until I bumped into trading merchants. Became an apprentice to an apothecary who happened to be a ronin, on the run. It was good for a little while, and I soon overtook my master. I have a talent for picking out the herbs in the wild and diagnosing the right ailment. Herbs and toxins, where they come from, what they do… my mind can just keep stock. It's one of the things I like to think I am genuinely good at."

"Why are you not with them now?"

Hinata shifted her eyes guiltily to the left. "I discovered that my master had discovered my identity, and was conspiring with the other merchants to travel to Kiri—to hand me to a black market hack and slash surgeon. Money reward, renter the Shinobi world. You can imagine"

"What did you do?"

Hinata met his eyes. "What you would have done were you in that situation."

Was Sasuke's face troubled? Did a murmur of discontent travel over his face as she said the damning words? Did he expect better of her?

Like an unbolted door swinging open in a storm, a tumult of repressed emotions ran over her without check, without repercussion. How had she forgotten her Father so easily. He had told her to kill those who had killed him. He had never said to survive like a bottom-feeder, to forget herself, to hide her eyes like a coward and to disgrace her family name. She couldn't preform the simplest of her family dojutsu. She had forgotten the Katas, the regimens that had been branded into her from childhood. She was a disgrace, not even worthy to deem herself a Hyuuga.

"You should go to sleep," murmured Sasuke, quiet spectator to her internal struggle, the emotions flitting over her face.

For once, Hinata agreed with him as her head began to feel oddly heavy and her eyes closed to a restless sleep, her ethereal form walking restlessly by the Naka river, unable to leave the banks as the compounds burnt, and in a melodramatic whim, the Naka stained red with blood.

* * *

><p>She woke up a second time, thoroughly peeved that Sasuke had used genjutsu on her, but doubly annoyed when she realised she was sleep dribbling on her pillow.<p>

Detaching herself out of the genjutsu, she made herself aware of her small surroundings—a dimly lit room, small, only her bed and a flat-pack wardrobe to the side, an apple-box storage container at the bottom of the metal frame bed.

She shook herself and made sure she wasn't still under the genjutsu, though in honesty, she could feel the unsavoury dregs of his chakra still circulating through her own pathways. In the apple-box, tightly folded, was her jacket, and underneath her vials and antidotes, all accountable. She let her chakra seep through the coat. All her plant samples were in place, creased slightly perhaps, and a little more worn than she had last seen them, but considering the fight that she had been through, she was lucky they were all in place.

There was a note.

_**Your name is Nori.**_

_**Keep your contacts in.**_

_**Don't do anything stupid.**_

Had she made an ally of the Uchiha?

She stretched, testing out her muscles, flexing her sinews, assessing how long she had been out for. Hard to tell, but the bruising that she had felt before had blossomed into the colour of an over-ripe peach and was angry to the touch.

A mirror to the side confirmed her slightly dishevelled appearance—her contacts still in place—wide eyes, pretty Barbie pink, clashing with her matted hair. Sasuke had done a decent job on her face—you could barely tell the nose had been broken, though it was definitely slightly crooked, but that was to be expected.

Two long steps and she was at the door, seeing if this khaki coloured room was a cell or a room. The handle moved under her ministrations, and opened, peering into a corridor the same colour, illuminated in the same way as the room that she had exited, by long strip lights that hung from the ceiling. She sighed. It was unlikely that she would escape now, and the potential risk was greater now. As long as she wasn't here, where Kabuto could find her, when he realised that Trio wasn't what he thought it was, she could be fine.

She just needed to think of it as another job.

She went back in her room and put back together her kit- her satchel, her jacket and her vials in all the correct pockets, leaving nothing awry, like she had never been here, save for the rumbled state of the thin blanket and pillow. She smelt unsavoury, and she was glad the Uchiha hadn't attempted to bathe her in her induced state. Presumably, this was the lair. It was more like a hotel.

Passing out she noted that her room number was 562. She supposed that Orochimaru's subordinates had a habit of checking in and then checking out permanently.

She didn't know which way to turn.

She blew her cheeks out like a gerbil, and moved to door number 564, knocking curtly and hoping her next door neighbour was not too much of a psychopath.

The door opened slightly. "Who's there?"

"Ano- My name's Nori… I'm your new next door neighbour." Hinaa attempted a smile as the door creaked open a little further, a dark haired woman exposing herself in the light of the hallway.

"Oh… the pharmacist," the woman explained, running her magpie-like eyes down Hinata's body. "You're the one who came in with Uchiha-sama."

"Yes. I am. Could you please tell me where the showers are… and where I can get some cleaning stuff- you know, toothbrush, towel, soap."

"Normally we get them stashed in our wardrobes when we arrive. Did you see Uchiha-san topless?"

"Thank- no. No I did not." Hinata flustered, face reddening, hands pedalling in front of her in protestation.

"Ah. When Karin heard that Sasuke was escorting a woman, she declared war if you had seen him in a compromised position. I trust you wouldn't be so stupid to break our little family here?"

"Oh- no of course not." She reddened further. What had happened to Sasuke whilst he had been sitting on her back was a s compromised as a male could get, fully clothed However, he wasn't topless at the time, so presumably Karin should have now worries. As for the incident, she supposed Sasuke wasn't going to talking about that to anyone. "He knocked me out for the majority of the trip."

To be fair, that was the truth.

"Oh. That's good." the woman smiled plastically, like a doll that had lost its newly brought shine. Hinata thought her very pretty. "Name's Kin. The facilities for showering and laundry are on the floor below, and shops for buying new clothing and equipment, on the floor below that, by the canteen. That's the training floor too. This is the woman's dorm. Disturb me again, and you'll wake up one day covered in Senbon like a porcupine, and we won't want that now, yes?"

Hinata nodded. She'd landed a psychopath next door.

Kin extended her hand. "Nice meeting you." she shook like a man, and slammed the door, leaving Hinata scuttling for the relative safety of her room, ripping open the wardrobe and gaining the products—cheap and tawdry they were, they would do for the moment.

* * *

><p>After a short but easing stay in the female communal showers (where none of the other women had attempted to attack Hinata, preferring to ignore one another in awkward, naked silence) and a short time spent in the Laundromat, cleaning her jacket (after placing her plant samples in her satchel) she considered herself ready to go into the"shops". Basically they were dispensaries where you ordered in what you needed with your room number and hoped for the best, though they did hand her a few old senbon so she could train, after explaining nicely that that was what she really needed.<p>

She had a few odd looks—most Shinobi here were wearing an item of dark purple colouring, and her lilac jacket caused a few Shinobi to gaze over her oddly—a few raised eyebrows, a few long stares. One didn't need to make assumptions to presume Kabuto was well known and feared in this establishment, and there were still some fairly obvious blood stains on the jacket- from the unfortunate ninja from Ame, or the hunter-nin's, or even her own. There was still a noticeable tear too, in the shoulder, and she needed a replacement.

The canteen was just as miserable as the rest of the lair that she had seen- strip lighting illuminating plastic tables (cheap, easy to replace, easy to wipe blood off off), distasteful smelling food, the general aura—that of crushed silences, and displaced dreams, and mind numbing servitude.

She had probably eaten worse, she mused, casting her eye over the selection and choosing a light noodle meal to soothe her stomach, eyeing the server. She was hungry, and she still had no idea what purpose her time here was to be spent in doing, save that her skills were needed.

Might as well make a free meal of it.

The canteen was actually fairly full, and Hinata didn't know where to sit. She wasn't a social butterfly by anyone's standards, and sidling up to battle worn killers was not her idea of social interaction.

She spied a cluster of black hair near the back of the canteen, and walked towards it, sensing familiarity and a space devoid of Shinobi.

Sasuke Uchiha ate, daintily picking at his noodles, swivelling his eyes to Hinata as she sat opposite, raising an eyebrow as she sat down opposite him, bracing herself as if against a storm, her lips slightly trembling as she finally raised her eyes to his, and nodded.

The subdued murmur of the canteen quieted further, interest taken by the surrounding shinobi in the new addition and the Uchiha loner- not one of them, but no better than them, no matter what the kunochi said. Even the loudest table of kunochi swivelled and watched, with quick, trained eyes.

She placed her chopsticks on the plate, one clattering off, and rolling to the side, her hands treacherously touching one another, tapping one finger to another. Noodles steamed unappetisingly between them, cheap oyster sauce curdling over the slimy noodles.

He raised his eyebrows.

She leant into his personal space, hair ghosting over the table, catching on the edges, like a siren moving out of the sea, and out of her element, lips pursing. Her hands fiddled in the thought of asking something so personal to the man who had manhandled her so quickly during the previous week, with such quick anger, and such malice. The hair at the back of her head raised- this was a stupid idea. She should be plotting his death, not attempting to voice these treacherous thoughts like a secret confided.

But the look in his eyes- the eyes that only confirmed her thoughts, that duplicated and echoed her own in a sombre, black ways only encouraged her thoughts, her feelings that needed to spill over into the rift between them, to form a flimsy and awkward bridge, but a bridge nonetheless.

"Uchiha-san… have you ever contemplated… thoughts of revenge?"

* * *

><p>"Ah, so you've chosen to come to me…"<p>

"Nori, Sir." Hinata was glad for her contacts.

The black haired man glided over to her, not looking ill in any way, golden slits of eyes roaming freely, his dextrous tongue touching the white corner of his mouth . "I suppose you wish to discuss payment, before the ailment."

"That wo-would be correct, sir." Hinata answered, tremor taking advantage of her.

"So apart from paying for your keep, you expect a lump sum from me?"

Hinata blinked. "I would be willing to forgo a lump sum, for information on an organisation I'm interested in."

The Sannin smirked, raising a hand to her, running his white ghastly hands through the tendrils of her hair, assessing his new, interesting toy.

Hinata resisted the urge to flinch away from her new Master's intrusive touch. "I would like information on the Konoha organisation called ROOT."

* * *

><p><span>Author's note<span>

Thank you for reading and thank you for all the reviews (especially the anonymous reviews, who I can't thank over PM!)- It's a real pick up and motivation (I was rejected from my top choice university so my weekend has been a medley of sulkling dramatically and vodka, the cure of all ills...)

If anyone is interested, I still have a poll up on my page (Check it out, please!) about what people think should be done to Shibo.

Anyhow- shit is going down. Namely, Hinata and Sasuke's first cringe inducing close encounter, the purpose and plot of this fic (REVENGE!) is emerging, and well, don't worry about Hinata being too weak- she's going to have to get better.

Heads up to wingedmercury, because she is my grammatically correct rock. I didn't know what an em-dash was before she came into my life...


	4. Chemotherapy is poison

**Something rotten in the state of Otogakure **or **Chemotherapy is poison**

* * *

><p><em>For peace of mind, I would like to remind readers that this story is rated 'M' and will certaininly be fulfilling the criteria for a mature story. <em>

* * *

><p>A Bunsen burner roared to her left, the flame oxygenated to a clear flame. She crushed the tendrils of a Solvervine plant with a pestle, her hands working mechanically, grinding and crushing the essence of the plant into sweet smelling grey goo. She added more solvent to the gloop in the mortar and returned to work, crushing the sample, and on occasion picking out pesky veins and stems, twisting her hand sharply to properly ease the plant's small leaves into a suitable agent for her work.<p>

Karin's eyes peered into the back of Hinata's head, perhaps in the hope that she would gain access to the hidden depths of Hinata's mind. Hinata had become accustomed Karin's own eyes—Hinata had quickly realised that Karin was a chakra sensor, and at that, a far more acute and impressive sensory type, far beyond Hinata's own paltry senses. But the woman's eyes only put her at unease. Hinata's own chakra coils, the ones that branded her a byakugan user, twitched in terror of being discovered, despite the fact that her relative disuse had rendered the coils almost undiscoverable.

Anyhow, it had become imperative that Hinata's assigned assistant needed to be neutralised as a threat.

Hinata turned around, as if her extensive peripheral sight didn't allow her to watch every single action that Karin committed (namely slacking off). "Do we have any Havra grass in the compound?" she asked innocently.

The red haired girl jumped to attention, raising her latex gloved hand to her mouth.

Quick as a flash, Hinata dashed to her side, and forced Karin's hand down, dragging her gloved hand away from her mouth.

"WHAT THE HELL!" screeched Karin, jerking back from the contact, face twisting into mask of anger—but at that, a mask only, a façade that Hinata realised was a farce to put others at ease in her company and to ultimately underestimate her, to hide her quick intelligence. A potentially deadly mistake.

"Solutions made from Solvervine are toxic if inhaled!" Hinata squeaked, waving her own hands about in mock panic, as if she hadn't predicted this turn of events.

Karin stood, slightly stupefied, opening and closing her particularly glossy lips in mortification, cheeks paling slightly, some tremor of true, real emotion shifting underneath the clever façade. "…Cheers," muttered Karin.

The red haired girl's lips misted over one another in exaggerated thought. They were a delightful shade of cherry red, and glazed with gloss. The shine caught Hinata's eyes, and like a magpie, she coveted the glimmer for herself—she would have to enquire as to where in the Shinobi hideout Karin had managed to procure something trivial like lip-gloss. Her own lips were cracked and flaky, and she certainly envied Karin's own pair.

"WHY ARE WE COMBINING POISONS FOR OROCHIMARU-SAMA'S TREATMENT!" Karin suddenly yelled, her façade leaping to the conclusion her brain had made as soon as Hinata had told her that she was combining a toxic element , flicking her latex gloves into a harmful waste disposal bin as she glared at Hinata.

"Have you not read the file we've been given?" Hinata chided, pointing to the thick file that rested amongst the unused portion of the lab.

Karin mentioned to pick it up, only to spin around and face Hinata once more.

"How do I know that I have the clearance to read this?" She was testing Hinata now, assessing Hinata's loyalty. Hinata wondered if Kabuto, Orochimaru, or some other, third party had put Karin up to this.

Hinata raised an eyebrow, eyes focusing on Karin's gloriously plump lips. "You're working as my assistant, I expect that you'll have some comprehensive ideas should you read it. You're loyal to Orochimaru-sama anyhow, right? As long as you don't talk to anyone about Orochimaru-sama's problem, I have no worry that you should know about this information."

Hinata turned around once more, tearing her focus from Karin's cherry coloured lips to the stagnating solver vine mush, wondering how she could extract the drug from this to something that could actually be ingested and absorbed by the human body, especially one that was as resistant and powerful as the Snake-sannin.

The situation was ironic, Hinata mused. But then again, the shinobi profession generally was. She picked up a pipette and began to measure small amounts to centrifuge and split.

Behind her, Karin slowly flickered through the file, the only sound being the slap of laminated papers against one another, and the quick inhalation of Karin's breath as she read Kabuto's diagnosis, a sharp sudden intake of air, followed by a soft, gagging sound as the information digested, and condensed, the reality of the situation made apparent.

"Is this—this true?" came Karin's voice, unusually small as she set the file down with shaking hands, like it was something dirty, or worse something harmful, something that could get her killed, like a bomb that could explode if manhandled.

"Yes. I had a similar reaction," Hinata twisted her small neck to look at Karin again. "It's going to be hard to do anything productive."

Karin paled to the colour of milk, mouth opening and gagging for air, and despite herself she _swooned_. For Hinata, swooning called to mind the heroines of myths, sagging and sighing in the protagonist's arms, women wearing lace and ornate kimonos, with little to think about and even littler to say. But Karin, in that moment, _swooned_—her lips lost colour and her muscles lost tension, her red piercing eyes rolling into the back of her head, mouth agape, falling like a rag doll, a marionette without stings. Clichéd perhaps, but dreadfully apt. For the second time, Hinata rushed forward, this time preventing Karin from fainting into expensive and complicated specialist distillation equipment. Karin sagged in her arms.

Hinata hooked a swivel stool from under the lab top and plonked Karin down on it, Hinata's hands ghosting over Karin's body, feeling the chakra fluctuate in palpitations under her fingers, a sign of shock.

"It's… such a bad diagnosis. How…" were the words on her succulent, red lips.

Her lips were still reddened, the tinted lipgloss shining under the blanching light of the lab light, but clashing with the greyness of her skin.

Hinata smiled softly, unable to comprehend how such a ghastly man like Orochimaru could inspire such loyalty in his subordinates. The obvious course of action was to to ease Karin's unease, by obvious, blatant distraction and pandering. It seemed like the most normal, civilian thing to do. "We must do what we can with the skills we have been given." Hinata checked that no more equipment was vulnerable to Karin's mood swings. "How much skill do you hold with… chemicals, plants? You know. Drug stuff."

Karin blinked owlishly at Hinata for the moment, her colour slowly regaining, her cheeks reddening from the mortification of being so weak in the presence of a superior. It was only worse that she considered this person a potential rival.

"I worked with poisons, and for a little while I was used to assess chakra flow with new drugs… I'm not useless, I can work with medicines too! I'm just not a scientist… our scientists working on that section were massacred in an accident—but I can view chakra fluctuation in our test subjects."

Hinata attempted to not flinch at the thought that all their pharmacists had been massacred in some accident—she had no wish to play around with drugs that could kill an entire group of people at once. "No matter. I've always wanted an apprentice... I'll make sure you'll learn useful, new skills!"

Hinata made a note to only teach Karin poison recipes that she already had a resistance to.

Karin brightened for a moment, then darkened, glowering, still eyeing Hinata with suspicion.

"You're still not at peace with me. We need to work together well if we are to attempt this task," Hinata's currently pink eyes flickered over to the file, now resting auspiciously on the lab top, innocently.

Karin's mouth tightened. "What you're doing now…"

"Is a preparation for the first round of treatment."

"We're poisoning him."

"Chemotherapy is poison." There was no empathy in her voice for the Snake Sannin.

* * *

><p>He creeped her out.<p>

The Snake Sannin made no attempt to hide or disarm his subtle advances, the soft touches, the long, ghastly stares, the way he would lick his mouth and smirk, knowing that Hinata could never drag her eyes away from the rolling motion of that pink white tongue skirting around the corner of his mouth, the promise of teeth, of canines sharp and deadly hidden behind that long, rolling tongue.

That oddball sexual desire, the part of her that wanted to touch and explore the most horrific of injuries, the weirdest of statures was struck agog.

And without any motive of brightness, of light, of a role model who stood constantly in the lightness of the world, the darkness that consumed Hinata's aura, the depression, the bitterness, the weakness, defined her.

If the odds were against her, she would be the first to surrender.

There was very little to be gained in resisting. Her family had resisted Kohona, and the odds were greater that the Hyuuga could ever amass, and the Hyuuga had lost in the worse possible way. She knew better than to resist the Snake Sannin, the tip of his tongue touching on the corner of her ear for an instant whilst he looked over her work, his breath snaking down her exposed neck, the spot of moisture on her ear the only suggestion of contact.

But one could surrender and make it into a win. The path of resistance, of stubbornness and stupidity was barred to her. She knew better to believe she was superior to any other shinobi in means or skill, and she knew that it was laughable to suggest she was the most intelligent. She was no strategist. But even with her modest self-view, she knew better to underestimate herself, or for that matter, her opponents. She understood enough strategy, and she had learnt of trickery—how to fuck with the enemy, how to deceive, and how to lie, and how to prepare and organise her thoughts into one cohesive action. She would not be extinguished like her family had been. The lessons of a hard history had been learnt. To be a shinobi was not about being the fastest, or the strongest or the most intelligent, and those who did not appreciate that fact were sent like lambs to the slaughter.

"You're working very hard, Nori- _chaaaaaan. _I appreciate that commitment."

"Thank you sir," her voice was always tight, and chipped. She knew what this man can do, and would do, and wanted to do with her, and although she had no wish to jump into bed with a villain as notorious as he. She knew what those fingers have done, and the ever rising ring of acid reflux is enough to combat any libido she possessed.

So for every lingering touch, for every ghosting look, she focused on the schematics, breaking down his body so much that he is no longer the identity, Orochimaru. He is the patient. A collection of organs, working together in unison until the ticking over of the cancer, the only immortal product of Orochimaru's relentless search for eternal life slowly corrupts and destroys, just as Orochimaru has to so many others.

There's a hilarious irony present, like every shinobi situation but Hinata doesn't voice her conviction.

For every body that he possessed & spliced himself into, his DNA went mental, forming cancers quicker and larger in each body, until the lumps become so big that new bodies had to be procured before the organs of the previous host completely give out. As obviously painful and uncomfortable as the treatment was, Hinata possessed no sympathy. Hinata rationalised that if you have the ability and intelligence to mess with your own DNA, you should be intelligent enough to recognise that heinous and unforeseen complications could and would occur; Orochimaru's cancers were getting larger and larger, and faster and faster with every body that he lived within, and that was only due to his desperate search for immortality, and rushed self treatment.

It had got to the point that even with regular operations under Kabuto's knife weren't sustainable. In desperation, a round of chemotherapy, provided by Kabuto's drug expert, was suggested.

And in lieu of the fact that all of their pharmacists had been killed in an unfortunate neurotoxin accident, Hinata was literally dragged in.

* * *

><p><strong>Meet me tonight in training room seventeen, floor three, at nine.<strong>

Hinata blinked at the note in her storage box, dumped underneath her new underwear, nestled in the bra cup she had selected to wear tomorrow. She wondered if this was a new form of sexual harassment.

It was Sasuke's handwriting, it was unmistakable. It was ostentatiously large, the "g"s looped, the "t"s lazily drawn, crossed like an afterthought, slacking to display a lack of classic education, a greater familiarity with the sword than the pen. And there was conflict in the writing—it was jagged, quick, scrawled then pausing near the end. In her mind's eye she could see Sasuke looking over the note; It was tempestuous, but controlled, like a tsunami in an ink bottle, deliberation mixed into Sasuke's normal devil may care attitude.

She ground her teeth and put the note into her treasured almanac of pharmacology and formulations with the other note, wedged between two pressed flowers, petals covering the notes like a cabaret girl hiding her body with fans.

There was something rebellious here—something shared, an impulse to be hidden from the others that surrounded them, to be held in the darkest corner of the mind, whilst it grew in magnitude. These notes could be the kindling for revolution.

She put the almanac in her satchel with all her other bits and bobs. She trundled down to her assigned lab, through the mazes of corridors and stairwells, moving from strictly shinobi territory to the clinical science area, populated by white coated scientists that refused to meet one another's eyes.

All through lab she was nervous—she didn't show it, but her actions gave her away- mixing up small but important ingredients, forgetting to add buffer, messing up sterile conditions and having to restart all over again, making a complex recipe of unusual reactants that she hoped would have some effect on Orochimaru's body—old chemical warfare drugs, things that were best left forgotten, but were dreadfully apt for Orochimaru's condition. It was unlikely that he could have a resistance to such anarchic chemicals, and they were perfect for the job. Traditional chemo drugs targeted fast dividing cells—because it was so hard to localise a drug, the drug had to be specified to the type of cancer cells, and the mix that she was working with, resulting in Fujariah oil from Solvervine and Havra grass amongst other plants.

But she couldn't quite concentrate, and her upset was so noticeable that even Karin asked her what was wrong. Hinata fell back on the uniquely female excuse of being in the midst of some serious PMS, and had run out of painkillers. Nonetheless the ones that Karin had offered had worked very well for her migraine.

Not even her lunchtime orange juice could settle her. It had been three weeks since she had talked to the Uchiha, and even then he had only fixed her with his eye and stared rudely, as if she had attempted to make conversation about the weather. Food was eaten in silence, and the sharingan user had left without acknowledging her a second time.

She had eaten on her own from then on, and faltered into distant memory for the Oto shinobi. Her mind had revolved back to work, where she could thrive and survive and curry favour with one of the most dangerous shinobi in history, and possibly escape the fallout when Kabuto realised that her opiate, 'Trio', wasn't quite what she made it out to be.

She returned to labwork, playing about with the chemicals, rationalising that great developments in science were nearly always discovered by mistake. If Orochimaru's most recent body failed overnight, it would hardly weigh heavy on her conscience.

She fell asleep in a report on the extraction process of cancer destroying drugs from crocus flowers.

She woke up, sleep dribble over the report, murmured to herself and glanced at the clock, blinking when time revealed to be five past ten. She rushed to her feet and grabbed her satchel, feeling the weight of her equipment, dashing out and locking the lab behind her.

Sasuke's writing flashed before her eyes. A training room. Perhaps he wanted to spar?

She could feel her equipment move against her as she sprinted, and she had taken some extra kunai in her satchel, just in case.

The training grounds were spread out over the compound, and this particular room was a pokey, small training ground that was usually used as a stomping ground for genin before they could take a larger, bigger area as their own. Dark moss spread in the corner of the room, propagating over the concrete of the snake head luridly leaning out of the wall. From the snake's mouth, a geyser of water that fell into a small pool that Hinata could only presume was drained. The snake's eyes glistened amber, their light and the torches around the high vaulted room being the only light.

Sasuke sat perched upon the snakes head, flickering through a book disinterededly.

He raised an eyebrow at her entrance as Hinata closed the door shut, attempting to assimilate the soft fluttering of her heart, the panic that she had walked into a trap.

"Hello…Sasuke-san. You did mean to call me here?" her fingers reach for the door in desperation.

"Yes."

Her hand droped to her side, and he slamed the book shut, leaping a good twenty meters down to ground level.

"You're seeking revenge?" he asked, as he strode purposefully towards her, eyes flickering over her form.

Hinata nods, fingers finding one another, hooking around one another, finding solstice in company.

"What information do you have?"

She deliberated over whether to tell him all that she does—it may pay to have an ace up her sleeve one day, but they were allied by their wish for revenge, and it seemed petty to not tell him everything that she knew.

She sighed deeply, as if she was replacing every molecule of air in her lungs. She told him about the meetings that she had attended, the gentle build-up accumulated hatred, the secret things that her father had told her in hope of her becoming his heir.

Shisui wasn't mentioned. She had no wish to mention the eyeless cadaver that floated in the back of her mind.

She finishes with an admittance of working for Orochimaru so she can receive information on ROOT. And shrugging gently, gazing up, realising she has been avoiding his caustic gaze for good reason.

"But you have no skills. You're useless."

The statement hit her like a ton of bricks. She frowned at him slightly, and shifted her feet. "I work best...with the element of surprise."

"Which we don't, and won't have."

"We?" the comment caught her off guard, the probability of a unison having not crossed her mind. Partnership doesn't seem like Sasuke's style.

Sasuke rolled his eyes.

"You need to train. Use this one to improve your skills, I've gone too far too much trouble to ensure that you can use your doujutsu in here without being observed. I want results."

He moved past her to the door, stalking swiftly past her, announcing his exit with the slam of the door, and leaving Hinata to the eerily empty room.

* * *

><p>She hadn't trained in a long time.<p>

Her katas felt like she was remembering something she had seen in a mirror in a dream—the figures felt wrong, the pacing clumsy, her footsteps odd, her muscles were not limber enough to flex to the movements quickly enough. Her tendons ached, and her muscles felt weak. Even her running time was off— running splints were persistent, her knees kept screaming under pressure, and she couldn't seem to gain speed. She needed to be faster, much faster, to have any kind of advantage at short range combat, and she knew it.

She began with cheap genin chakra training—even with her exceptional charka sensitivity and control, it was important that she could meld her chakra correctly, and as she had seen in combat, under pressure, she had lost the Hyuuga manipulation—the ability to expel chakra in an instant, through the pores of her skin, like an arrow to the other's chakra system.

The pool was good for stimulating alien chakra, fashioning it into a resistant material, like another person's chakra, and manipulating her own to move independently within the medium, until her head span with exertion and sweat pooled down her back. The natural style was beginning to recoup—her muscles retained some memory, and she was quicker and more agile, and though she had little chakra, the chakra she had was strong, and flexible.

But that new tenderness to her ability only deepened her frustrations with the Hyuuga style. Her chakra control was excellent, but her natural reservoir of chakra was smaller than most—a deadly combination of being naturally small and having a flexible, but weak element as her core; water users by default didn't have huge amounts of chakra. She couldn't afford to waste her chakra on fancy footwork (as so lovingly pushed onto her by her father) and the expulsion of ridiculous amounts of chakra.

The natural Hyuuga style required the expulsion of huge amounts of chakra, which naturally resulted in high amounts of wastage, and even with her chakra reserves strengthening and growing somewhat, the style simply wasn't economical—she had neither the stamina or reserve to maintain that style in combat.

So she had to adapt the style to her skills; she worked her core muscles with heavy exercises, stretching and twisting her body, her body naturally flexible and limber. Though she would never be a muscular shinobi, appearances could be deceptive, and her slim body could withstand much more than it looked like it could.

She had just finished a strengthening workout, her body dripping with sweat as she flexed her solar plexus into an unnatural position, feeling her muscles strain and ache as she raised a weighted leg until her body trembled with spasms, her hands digging into cracks in the concrete, water gushing from the centre of the room.

Sasuke stomped in, adjusting the collar of his shirt and raising an eyebrow, scowling as Hinata twisted towards him, her hair awry and her face red.

"It's four in the morning," he said.

Hinata blinked. Sasuke grimaced.

Hinata relaxed, her muscles ebbing in tides of pain, stretching to reach her toes and taking off the weight scrolls, deactivating her byakugan, though watching curiously as Sasuke waded into the pool, clothes on, and stood under the plume of water spouting from the Snake's mouth, eyes closed, head back, like he had found absolution in the cold water.

Hinata cocked her head, deliberating on whether or not to say something.

She thought against it and collapsed once again onto the floor, shoulder blades jutting against cold, hard concrete.

"Will you spar with me one day?" she asked. "There's only so much I can do on my own."

There was a long pregnant pause.

"When you're good enough," came Sasuke's garbled reply.

He sounded like he had no intention to talk, and Hinata had no wish to extend a painfully awkward conversation. Hinata exhaled and attached the weights to her wrists, beginning to perform a bastardised version of a Hyuuga kata, the sequence adapted for more leg swipes, less chakra exertion and wastage. Her legs ached, and her fringe was plastered to her forehead. She justified that she would deserve the time spent in the baths.

She finished with a long sweeping stretch, her arms swirling around her body, her chakra pulsing vividly in a haze of thinning aqua, like a mist dispersing into air.

She had used too much chakra but she took the weights off, happy that she could not perform such eloquent patterns with that weight when she started.

She made for the door, thoroughly exhausted, looking forward bed, and the empty dreamland that lay beyond her pillow.

"Hinata?"

She twisted on one foot as elegantly as she could manage in her tired state, raising a ragged eyebrow doggedly, having forgotten Sasuke completely.

Sasuke peered out from under the geyser of water, grey water slicking his hair back, his skin pallor ghastly white like talcum powder, the bags underneath his eyes a sick yellowy-green, veins all too visible under his skin, as if it were too tight for the flesh underneath.

"Do you have anything that can supress libido?"

Hinata cocked her head to the side, feeling ready to drop at any moment. Forget the bath. She'll go to bed and sleep in, showering when she woke up.

"There are a few substances," she answered.

"I want something permanent."

"Like a chemical castration?" she was too tired for this kind of stuff. She needed to sleep.

"Yeah. That would be good."

* * *

><p>Her body was aching. She'd been pushing herself hard, and her body was responding splendidly—she could feel herself getting fitter, and she had even got library books out on tactics in different types of environment. The shinobi in her was thriving here.<p>

But she wasn't going to train tonight. Working hard—and well—was one thing, but overexertion was another. Her body needed rest, and a long sleep was called for.

She sighed over her chemicals. Kabuto had told her that Orochimaru's cells had shown a response to the Fujariah oil—the bioterror drug that had killed so many in wars long gone. She now had something solid to go on, but she now had to get the drug into a controlled enough state to deliver to Orochimaru himself, and begin the course of treatment.

If she did a good enough job, perhaps Kabuto would forgive her for messing up the deal that she had made with him come whenever Trio started to loose, rather than gain him customers. However, her intentions of staying in contact were small—her gut told her that she would be better to escape from here. Sasuke presented her with a problem though—was Otogakure to be the base of their operations? Would there be operations even? And why on earth would the Uchiha want to supress his libido?

Perhaps the incident in the corn field had convinced him to chemically castrate himself? Hinata doubted it. Chemical castration seemed a wee bit too extreme for a minor accident.

She sighed into her chest and new snazzy, leather jacket, dolefully eyeing the file to her left. She had to present to Orochimaru her findings. It was three in the morning and she had been keeping odd hours, but the Sannin himself had said that he was available for whatever time there was a breakthrough. Presumably he would be around his private training ground. He too, kept odd hours.

Where was Karin when you needed her for back up?

She languished over to the file and picked it up, propping it under her arm like it would struggle away, locking the lab and walking to Orochimaru's own quarters, as slowly as possible.

The laminated floor gave way to an amber tile, a repeating pattern that not only covered the floor but the wall and ceiling. It was like entering the stomach of a snake—even the lights were dipped, and darkness seemed to breech the corridor. She turned to a door, biding her time, looking for patterns on the tiles.

She raised her hand, and knocked twice.

And waited.

There was no answer.

She knocked again, with less trepidation.

"Bollocks," she whispered, despite herself.

She timidly tried the knob.

It clicked under her touch, and she let herself in, peering into the darkness, exhaling when no angry Sannin leered out of the darkness for her.

She pattered into the training room, feeling highly conspicuous. A concrete snake head leered out of the darkness, the same motif repeated in all the training rooms. The snake's contemptuous gaze was basked by the flickering light from an open door.

She padded over to the light, presuming he was in there. She peered in.

The inhabitants heads spun towards her, like their necks were being twisted simultaneously by a poltergeist.

The file fell out of her armpit. She hardly noticed, she was so busy gawking, face becoming flushed, an unholy blush settling over her face like a pervert's.

And then she dry-heaved.

"Y-y-y-your-r-r fi-fii-fi-fi-le. Sir," she squeaked, unable to tear herself away.

But she did, and somehow she fled.

* * *

><p>Her room was almost a sanctuary. She sat down on the thin bed, feet shaking.<p>

How she had managed to run to her room without tripping over her feet, she had no idea.

She swallowed a rattling breath and attempted to comprehend what she had just seen, ignoring the creaking bellows of her lungs still heaving in her chest, her heart racing with the quick tempo of a horse galloping in terror.

She had just been mindfucked. And her eyes would detect a genjutsu. Who would be so messed up to imagine something like that, and spring that on her? Shits and giggles, this was not.

Nobody had followed her—she was sure that the inhabitants of the room, however preoccupied they were could have caught back up to her. They were probably now getting back to what Hinata had disturbed them, or rather, back in the throes of what they were doing.

She covered her hands with her eyes, and pressed, to attempt to erase the scene from her retina. She needed to do something mundane—something small to blank her thoughts into obscurity.

She needed a bath, direly.

She took out her towel and shampoo, instinct instructing her to do a simple sniff and taste test on the shampoo's and soaps before she applied it directly to her skin (on the premise that she would probably survive anything in small amounts), just in case some foe had slipped in an acid whist she were still out.

Her fears were ungrounded, and she was lucky that when she did arrive at the baths, cold and white and clinical—there wasn't a snake head faucet or burning amber eye slit anywhere.

She took a long, cold shower before wandering over to the steaming hot pool, removing her grey towel and pottering into the springs, attempting to ignore her rippling reflection—the paleness of her flesh from a deadly combination of being literally underground for a good few months, mixed shock.

She shook her head.

She needed to imagine something else so that her head would stop reeling.

She needed to get out of this.

Revenge. Why was she concentrating on things like this when she had the blood on her precious River Naka to rinse over her conscience?

She had provided Orochimaru chemotherapy that was effective. There was no need to keep her here for any longer—she wasn't a medic by any standard and there were back up solutions that would be appropriate should Orochimaru require more treatment. Why hadn't they given her that folder on ROOT? Perhaps Kabuto was suspicious of her—perhaps she was just paranoid.

She needed to get out of this dungeon, and feel the rising Hyuuga sun fall in rays on her brow, blessing her with golden strength, the strength of her ancestors, the Hyuuga flame roaring once more.

She sunk deeper into the steaming waters, holding her hands underneath her thighs, pulling her white, mottled legs to her naked chest in a comforting, lonely embrace.

There were runes on the floor. Grey and sliver and purple, glowing ghastly, throwing ghastly shadows on the walls. Maroon blood lay over the top, the kind of blood that had been allowed to dry and become crisp, puddles that had become scabs to a wound. And in the centre…

She couldn't think about that. She had forgotten the snake that was ringed within the circle of runes, velvet scales reflecting the actions of the inhabitants of the circle. There might have been bones too—skulls of animals, sheep, cows, large cats and humans, mixed together like a forgotten pile of toys.

Her eyes did really see too much.

And in the middle of the circle, her employer, captor, jailor. Orochimaru, naked as a child, white and perverse and wearing another person's skin like his own, filling it out, and fleshing into it. And then there was Sasuke, physically tied up on a pyre of bones, bound by snakes looped extensively around his arms, his hands limp, but his head deliberately jutting up in defiance, the ark of his jawline bathed in the flickering of the light, despite the snake's heads buried in his neck. Hinata counted at least three. Blood poured sluggishly down his body, down his exposed chest, red blood closeted by his torn white shirt, linen ripped to threads, bite-marks evident.

And Orochimaru was in the process of licking the blood off Sasuke's flaccid penis.

_OhGodOhGodOhGod_. What the fuck was _wrong_ with these people?

And Sasuke was physically gagging, eyes rolling in his head, chest expended as if he were nailed to a cross as Orochimaru's hand probed further into the darkness between Sasuke's legs, further into Sasuke's trousers, that long, evil smile twisting his face in two.

It was soul destroying. Mind bleaching. She needed to erase this, but she had neither the means nor the method. She clenched her legs tighter.

She sank deeper until her hair floated around her like a mist of dense chakra, tickling her back like an over-friendly comrade.

And as they had seen her—and their expressions were horrific. Orochimaru's naughty schoolboy grin, dripping blood from his mouth as he ringed Sasuke's foreskin with the tip of his freakishly long tongue. And then there were Sasuke's wide eyes, full of victim's panic, blood that should have been in his head dripping down his chest. But he was angry too, shaking not only from blood loss from the snake's clamped in his jugular, but by the tempest breaking out in his body, the anger, the embarrassment, the failed ambition, the hubris.

It was making him hard.

It was enough to make Hinata want to cry.

* * *

><p>"I've looked up chemical castration. I have a few things we can try."<p>

It had been a long two weeks, avoiding Sasuke. Typically it was easy, providing that she didn't train. But there were times, wandering over to the Kunochi table with Karin when she would single out his form in the corner, and feel guilt descend to her stomach, to be turned and twisted, the internal organ only feeling pity. The incessant cooing of the other Kunochi about his attributes, his victories, his missions, his closeness to the Master—didn't help.

The training room was the same as usual, Snakehead pouring water into the pool, mildrew spreading from the corner of the room and lights flickering—shadows dancing with the plume of water. Sasuke stood like he was waiting for absolution, under the water, sending the spray flying horizontally.

Sasuke's eyes lurched to her in a drunk, sick way. He was probably still in half-genjutsu, or even in shock.

He's getting the scent off, she realises as she removes her sandals before wading into the pool of water, standing just below the Snake's nose, gently clasping Sasuke's bony shoulder and guiding him to the edge of the pool, noting the loss of weight, but the tautness of the muscles, and the broadness of his shoulders, and the weight they carried.

Where she had grown in strength, he had become diminished. While she was all too aware of her limits, and the things that posed a danger to her, he was far too haphazardly cocky. He didn't know his limits, and instead, tested them, pushed them and probed. And Orochimaru had probed back.

"We're going to kill him," Sasuke whispered, words ringing hollow, as if he were disappointed that measures had come to this. "I want you to poison him with the treatment you give him for his aliment."

Hinata assessed just how lucid he was. Sasuke's eyes met hers and she realised, with a sudden jolt, that he was completely and utterly sane, and that he had no inclination of his tutor's illness.

"He has cancer. He'll be weak for you when he starts his chemotherapy."

Sasuke blinked, digesting the information, his dark, thick, girly eyelashes fluttering as his eyes finally began to dilate. "He'll be weak," he said, a musing from a small, vocal part of his mind.

"Do you think you could take him if you were both at full power?"

Sasuke laughed with melancholy. "Do you think I fuck him because I enjoy it?"

Hinata blushed unbecomingly, looking away whilst Sasuke pulled himself together, piercing back the mask of his charade in her presence.

"He'll be weak next week. In his chambers, recuperating. I would strike then." She revolved her shoulders and grimaced, suddenly chilled, raising her head to meet the amber eyed snake statue that hovered above them. "But we need the information on ROOT—I would rather have the information and be able to utilise it, than have to scope it ourselves."

"I can't do anything—it makes me look suspicious if I suddenly show interest in a covert operation in a village I've supposedly abandoned."

"I'll talk to Kabuto."

She really didn't want to, and it showed. But she could see the bruises now, only half-healed, and sore over Sasuke's neck, the incision where the snakes ate from red and raw, but healed, and down his shirt, the bruises on his clavicle and spine visible, despite the taut layering of muscle that threatened to wane. She had no doubt that the binding snakes have left their mark, or for that matter, Orochimaru was gentle in any sense of the word.

And despite herself, she outstretched her hand, and like a ninja Fairy Godmother, sprinkled cooling, soothing, healing chakra. "I have herbal ointments that will reduce swelling and soreness. They also work well on the areas that you're not going to let me see, let alone heal."

"And you're not going to attempt to kill me?"

Hinata attempted a half smile, jerking the corners of her lips up violently. "I'm useless, remember?"

"Hn." Sasuke bit back an uncharacteristic guffaw as Hinata parried over a particularly tender spotting of bruises- a ring of repeated human bite-marks around the crux of neck and shoulder, made in a frenzy. Bloodlust, she supposes.

In a deft manipulation of her positioning, Sasuke snatched her hand, and clasped it in his own, placing the back of her hand horizontal to the strait of his mouth, as if he were to kiss it.

He inhaled, a look of contemplation concentrated on his face, until Hinata jerked her hand away, but not before Sasuke mentioned to drop it.

"I needed the scent of a woman."

It's not much of an explanation, and she wonders for her comrade's sanity once more. She almost placed her hand to her face for an experimental sniff. What could she smell of that could represent the flesh of a woman? Her skin smells of chemicals and chemistry, bitter herbs and solvents, like smelling salts and rubbing alcohol, like sterility and obsessive cleanliness. There is nothing feminine, or soft, or anything you would want to smell after being molested by a being like Orochimaru. Hinata fears her face is uncontrollable, twitching in freakish fascination with the boy in front of her.

He shrugged the whim off. "When is the treatment going ahead?"

Her thoughts were once again pulled to Sasuke. Once again he was the mechanical, straight-talking man Hinata knew. To feel pity for a man of Sasuke's unique calibre was to be a fool for wasting emotion.

"Thursday."

"He'll die Thursday night then. Get the information by then and come back here."

"I'll leave the salve in here tonight," Hinata passively murmured, thoughts drifting to the problem of Kabuto, and her lose of protection, should Orochimaru die.

"Good"

* * *

><p>"Kabuto-san," she announced to his lab, a step-up from the Suna Cheapside whorehouse, directing to her speech to the mop of grey hair that quivered as the doctor laboured over a white desk, pen scratching into the paper.<p>

"Ah… I believe you're calling yourself Nori-chan now, eh, Hinata?"

"I was Emi before that, and Hiriko even before that; you know how it is Kabuto-san," Hinata giggled into her sleeve playfully, watching the man for any advances. He was not lecherous like Orochimaru, thank goodness, and showed little interest in humans, save for those that were dead and viable for body parts.

The scientist looked up from his notes and chuckled. "I suppose I do. Where's that delightful companion of yours nowadays?"

"Oh. Shibo would go mad in a place like this. I'll summon him when I need him."

"How thoughtful of you. Are you here for a social call?" he leant on his fist and smiled widely, in a mockery of a welcome, civility just withstanding between the drug dealer and the pharmacist.

"Ano—I meant to ask if my fee is to be paid—I presumed that I was not to be kept on?" Hinata timidly tapped her fingers to one another—she was surprised they had kept her in for so long. She was only so useful.

"Oh. No. Yes. Well, we do keep an eye on Konoha, and ROOT is of interest of us, I do have your file. I trust you are not leaving us forever."

"Oh, I have no doubt that you'll be able to track me down no matter how many times I change my name," she laughed gaily, but truthfully, she had no doubt that should Kabuto need to find her (and perhaps he would, after he found out about "Trios" more interesting effects) she would be hunted down efficiently and quickly. She was cavorting with the student of a Sannin, and she should have never taken him so lightly.

"Of course, of course Nori-chan. You have great potential, and should we have any issues you can be sure that you will be tracked down immediately."

"I have no doubt."

"Why is ROOT of interest to you?" Hinata sensed something there: a flash of his quick eyes, an adjustment of the curling hair behind his ear, the sudden slippery, rubbery nature of his smile. A slant of the light quickened over his horn-rimmed glasses.

"I'm looking for my sister. There's a small percentage chance she was wrapped up with them, and it's worth looking into. Unlikely, but this is the only place that would present the opportunity of actually infiltrating a place like that," she said, the lucidity and audacity of Hinata's easy lying skills never ceased to amaze her.

"Oh—is there a Kekkai Genkai in the family?" Hinata came to a juddering realisation. ROOT was specifically engineered against the Kekkai Genkai threat—she had been suspicious, but for Kabuto to ask so directly—he must be assessing her reactions, seeing how she reacted.

Hinata pondered, chewing her lip, as if in thought, desperately considering a way out of this dead-end. "My sister had another father. I wouldn't know much about him. I just want to find her grave. I don't have much hope."

That was good. Kekkai Genkai in a half-sister- didn't put her in danger, and if her sister was presumed dead, there would be no need to follow her in hope of finding a girl who may or may not possess Kekkai Genkai. Waste of time and manpower.

"I wouldn't put up much hope if she was tangled up with ROOT," Kabuto sniggered.

"I don't," Hinata said, relaxing. She hoped she had diffused that particular timebomb.

Kabuto stretched and took a file from the shelf, throwing it to her.

"ROOTs not the easiest place to get information from, but we manage. Stay in contact. Talk to Sasuke when you want to leave—he got you in, he'll take you out."

"Oh, of course. Thank you."

"Hey—is there anyway I could convince you to stay?" The glasses glinted.

Hinata shrugged. "My sister..."

"The facilities here are something else. We have lots of clinical scientists here, and we were unfortunate to loose so many pharmacists. I can assure you we would put you to good use. It would be hard for you to find work outside, and you would be fed and clothed here," he nodded to her new leather jacket.

"I'll have to see if I can contact you after I've found what became of my sister. That's my priority."

"A pity. Would you like escorting to the testing facility—I'm sure you would be intrigued."

"I'm sure but-"

"I insist."

The doctor was not going to take no for an answer, and Hinata saw no issue with humouring him. As slimy as he was, he seemed genuinely interested in keeping her on, and she could see that she could become somebody important here.

"Oh—go on then!" Hinata smiled, gingerly touching her fingers together, brushing her fingers over one another and gamely blushing, flattered by the warm attention.

Kauto waved her over to the lift in the corner of his room and mentioned for her to get inside, following her in and tapping in a five digit combination, catching Hinata's eyes. Five digits, the number pad being named from one to nine, if one was to calculate all the possibilities of combinations, it would be nine to the power of five.

Hinata subconsciously screwed up her eyes, attempting to mentally tackle the question, but losing her place as soon as she tried to cube nine.

"Well, you'll be able to keep your name if you stuck around—we take good care of our scientists here, and the opportunities are unparalleled," Kabuto explained from beside her, the lift shifting, dragging it's inhabitants downwards.

Hinata nodded, annoyed that she had lost sight of her calculations. A wave of chakra suddenly washed over her, lapping at her ankles first, with icy probing, like needles to her foot, but moving up her body like slime, fazing her for a moment.

"I didn't realise that you were so sensitive," Kabuto commented.

Hinata smiled shyly, not realising that her discomfort was visible, or that her resolve was dissolving.

"Some of our test subjects have particularly nasty chakra signatures, due to experimentation or genetics. Some sensors are particularly struck by the aura. There are dangerous subjects down here, but interesting. Orochimaru-sama allows for nearly any experimentation. No ethics committee here," Kabuto smiled like it was a good thing.

A fear gripped Hinata's heart as she was submerged in the mixing chakra, the chakra vibrating against the constraints of the cement foundations of the compound, reverberating back like a bat's echo. She had heard about the experimentation—in bits, and whispers. But she had pushed it to the back of her mind as she had worked here—everything had seemed so normal, so easy upstairs. She'd been lured into a false sense of security, how could she forget so quickly the Sannin's sinister reputation?

The door opened to a white corridor, scientists in full body suits scurrying up and down the hallway, eyes hidden behind industrial goggles.

Kabuto offered her one from a wall hook and she dressed quickly in scrubs, the sense of trepidation increasing, her fluttering heart cowering beneath her breast.

"Follow up."

She was in the worm's lair, and she had thought that she was precious. How quaint.

"We keep the shinobi away from this area, save for our medics. Better not twist their pretty little heads about some of our more interesting work, after all—"

A scream echoed down the hallway, hoarse and vicious but undoubtedly female. Hinata cringed on instinct. That had been the scream of a madwoman.

"Soldier pills that emulate certain Kekkai Genkai for periods of time. You could get interested in that, but I can't see that going anywhere soon—I believe the hypothesis is correct, but our techniques are at least fifty years too early to get the right chemicals working in the way we want to."

The scream bellowed again, and the chakra that Hinata was swimming in darkened with it as the woman's comrades attentions shifted.

A cackle came from a door to the left, far too high pitched, broken by odd, soft crunching noises, the noise of a tendon tearing, of marrow shifting, of bones being bored into. His chakra was the most pungent by far, soft and sickly, but clogging.

The woman screamed again.

The cackle sounded, soft crunches punctuating breaths.

The sickly-sweet phlegm chakra was strangling her, crushing her oesophagus, clawing at her.

The man cackled, once more, and Hinata couldn't stop herself from looking through the door, down, directly to the weedy man who gave her a rueful smile from the corner of the room. His ugliness made her flinch. But it wasn't his large, odd, misshapen head, nor the way his eyebrows tangled together like some bizarre caterpillar, or his leering smile, the drool falling in strings around his mouth, snot falling, mouth crunching methodically.

Crunch.

Crunch.

Crunch.

It was his poisonous chakra, easing out of his body with the same fanaticism as lemmings off a cliff. He wasn't trying to strangle her. He was getting her attention.

He wanted someone to see his last breaths, remember him, see him as a human, not an experiment chained half naked to a wall, machines hooked into his twisted body.

She peered closer, bearing witness to his last laboured breaths, the drool swing backwards and forwards in a gradually slowing manner, the man's rueful smile never disintegrating, as if he was apologising for his toe-curdling appearance.

"Chakra-exchange. Failure in all subjects. Last one," Kabuto commented coolly.

Hinata didn't leave the door.

The test experiment chuckled, head lolling awkwardly on his stick thin neck, his neck making that odd crunching noise, clacking and cricking with every temperamental twitch.

He cackled once more, then was very, very still, his eyes meeting hers through the pane of glass, droop dripping now, falling down his shoulder.

The chakra scratched once more, then fell, barely pawing at her neck.

The madwoman screamed and Hinata couldn't take a minute more.

* * *

><p>She settled down the salve, the brim of the container making a slight tapping noise that echoed around the training hall. She cleared her resolve, squaring up to Sasuke.<p>

She had made up her mind. It didn't matter that Orochimaru was a beacon of hope to the ronin of the outlying lands, a safe haven for refugees, and a curator of science. He was sadistic. He wore other's skins, and warped minds, bending the hopes and dreams of his subordinates to his whims. He may have been welcome to refugees, but in truth he was a warlord, playing on others misfortune to continue his own line of experimentation. No matter how many shinobi would offer their bodies to the snake, a monster was a monster eternally.

"Make sure he suffers," she said, disregarding the fact that there was no need to mutter that sentiment out loud.

* * *

><p><span>Author's<span> Note

Hello, and thank you for reading :) I'm making the chapters a little longer because I can't really promise continuing updates, so really, it's the best out of a bad situation! Thank you all so much for the fantastic reviews. I literally squee when I'm reading them and it does help me to be a bit more motivated! I would also like to say that none of the plants exist or have any real relevance to current cancer drugs or bio-terror, though there has been research into isolating cancer fighting compounds out of crocuses. I find it really interesting that the first chemotherapy drugs were developed from bio-terror chemicals. But that's the nerd in me speaking ;)

A big, lovely call out to the lovely Wingedmercury, who bless her heart, betas for me. If you love sasuhina, check out her story, "Better off dead"!

I was kind of peeved that only four people voted on my poll. Does no-one care for over-weight ninja ferrets? D:


	5. Something Wicked

**Something Wicked**

* * *

><p><em>Beta'd by the lovely WingedMercury. Go check her out!<em>

* * *

><p>Hinata sat, perched top of the concrete snake's head in the training room, waiting for Sasuke's eventual arrival. The collected information on ROOT was small, admittedly, but Orochimaru had obviously had an active interest in ROOT—all ninja forces had an unhealthy interest in Kekkai Genkkai, no exceptions.<p>

She was trying to figure out who was to blame. ROOT was a hidden organisation; the proof that it was actually related to the Hokage and the elders was hard to believe, and even though there were clear links to the elder Danzo, the other two elders and the Hokage both appeared in the clear.

But it made no sense to allow such a powerful figurehead, such as Danzo, to have such a large armed force at his disposal in peace-time; enough even for a potential coop, under the Hokage's nose. She suspected a greater entanglement of poltics, and if the Hokage and Danzo were both involved, it wouldn't be stupid to suppose that the two other advisors knew exactly what went on, and gave advice to the Hokage at the time of the crisis.

She scanned over the list again, recollecting several lessons from her short-lived academy life. The Hokage, Hiruzen Sarutobi was a member of Team Tobirama, the elect few who were the disciples of the Second Hokage. The advisors, Homura Mitokado, and the female, Koharu Utatane, were his teammates. They had been together since initiation to the shinobi-world as genin , and if the Hokage was involved, by natural progression, his teammates would be too.

Though she had been a Kohona team-member for a short time, she knew how close-knit and compact the teams were. It made missions much more effective, and the sense of comradeship decreased team mortality. To say that one member was involved in a situation where the other two were not was impossible to imagine. The advisors were almost certainly involved. Teams went through thick and thin together. Team Tobimara had waged wars, and kept the peace, well into their combined old age. If one was involved, they all were guilty.

She had a quick look over Danzo's segment again, and noted that he was of the same age as Team Tobirama, and had worked in the past with the Second Hokage. It wasn't a leap of faith to conjecture that ROOT wasn't his alone, even if he was as politically important as Team Tobimara.

Anyhow, it seemed, from several inconstancies in the spy reports that ROOT was very hard to infiltrate and gather information upon. If anything ROOT appeared to be the real shinobi force of the Hidden leaf village, in that there was little known about members, and that it was mostly hidden, the village being home for the covert operation. ROOT members were chosen as children, more often than not from villages in the Fire countries, but not in the capital, where suspicions could be aroused. The children raised were then brought up in a strict regimen of training, eventually cumulating in advancement when ordered to kill one another systematically, the chosen children eventually being filed down to small, distinct groups of survivors.

Hinata couldn't quite imagine such a thing. She knew that before the civil war, Kiri had employed such methods. But it was a pointless exercise. Being forced to kill somebody you considered a sibling did not create an emotionless shell. She doubted that the ROOT minions were as passionless as they appeared to be from the reports; all humans had tremors of emotion, and being a Shinobi tool did not equate the being a monster. If anything, if ROOT followed these rules, like any machine that routinely placed it's components under extreme pressure, without remorse or rest, would fail, and fail spectacularly.

Just like Kiri had.

Anyhow, there was very little to know about ROOT. It was a big organisation, bigger than it looked, and intelligent. The fact that Orochimaru hadn't infiltrated it successfully was testament to the fortress like nature of ROOT.

The training room door opened, and Sasuke entered, a shiny new katana dangling around his midriff. A gift from his older lover, perhaps.

"I've read over the ROOT file," she said, as way of greeting, barely glancing upwards.

Sasuke grunted as way of communication.

"It's going to be hard to crack. How do you feel about infiltrating Konoha, and assassinating the Hokage and three of the most influential advisors in history?"

It seemed like Sasuke was ignoring her for the moment. But when Hinata finally looked upwards, detangling herself from a jumble of hurried notes, Sasuke was paying more interest in the violent movement of the water, rather than her inane plotting. His jet-black eyes watched the geyser of water down, tracking the eternal pattern of ripples in the pool, mesmerised by the simple movement.

"I need to track down my brother first," he murmured, finally meeting her observant gaze. "I can't be sure of your information, and you still need to train and develop. You're not totally useless, but your weakness could be an advantage to us."

Hinata flinched slightly, drooping her gaze to the concrete of the snake, her hands tracing the line of the snake's raised brow as Sasuke played commander.

"I'm saying that you infiltrate Konoha, and find definitive proof. Espionage. I'll track down my brother. As you are now, you would just get in my way."

Hinata opened her mouth, closed, and then opened again, protesting against her assignement. "I would be going into the lion's den," she squeaked.

"You are a ninja, right?"

Hinata's face burnt despicably, her emotions unravelling in full torrent, making it hard for her to think, to talk, to do anything but simper and pound her lips together until the trail of stuttering echoing from her mouth finally gave way to cohesive thought. "N-n-nuh-nuh… no."

Sasuke raised an eyebrow, and for a moment Hinata hated him for being so obscenely strong, and so unapologetic, and proud in his own way- not modest, or coy in the least.

"I'm a-a poisoner. Poi-poisoner."

Sasuke looked unimpressed.

"I'm an-an assassin. I-I… don't have a nindo. No creeds or promises of loyalty or honour amongst scum like me. I don't have a village either. I have a headband, but that makes me as much as a ninja as your sore asshole makes you Orochimaru's bit…ch-ch..ch."

She had gotten carried away, and pushed forth onto no-man's land, and there were some things that really, _really_ didn't need to be said.

Sasuke's brow darkened, and for a moment Hinata worried that she had pushed too far, suddenly terrified of Sasuke's wrath lest he smote her into the training room floor. But then, after his jaw clenched for the longest moment, the corners of his mouth raised in a feral grin, glistening white teeth exposed. It was far more terrifying than before, but in combination with his handsome, knavish face, Hinata couldn't quite pull her eyes away to the bizarre show directed to her.

"At least you're not delusional," he teased suavely, a hint of just how persuasive and oily he could be when he wanted to be, how charming he could be, should he feel like it. His grin climaxed into a disarming, but oddly fake smile before falling back into a flat line, like it had never been there, and Hinata half believed that it had never been there at all.

"It's go-good to have a tight grip on reality," she tightly quipped back, ears burning red, and her face following suite, turning away, whilst blithely presenting the file to Sasuke.

"A-anyhow. I've never infiltrated an area before. The Konoha walls are well guarded, and what am I supposed to do, walk up to the walls and ask nicely? The defences are too secure without an insider, and I'm not comfortable with the thought of having no back-up. Infiltration isn't my speciality, and I believe that this file could provide us with alternate, less predictable routes. I'm not one for uncertainty. I don't rush into situations if I can help it… I'm not a coward. Just sensible."

He hardly regarded her comment and instead turned his attention to the file, his face flickered with little emotion when reading, only slightly showing some surprise when pausing over a page of financial slips concerning funding, his lips creasing into a concentrated grimace.

"I've met Gatou. He's dead."

"Huh?"

"The banker. The one that's mentioned in some of the isolated fragments, pertaining to the accounts of ROOT. He used to be a crime-baron in the wetlands. In my first large mission with team seven he was killed," Sasuke pursed his lips in a petulant, childish, way. "And this is dated after his death, far later. It looks like a scam. Forgery. Che. Look at that signature. Do you think that looks like a signature of a well-educated, rich man who almost certainly never left his desk, albeit a dead man? I met the man, and I can guarantee that Gatou did not have a signature like that."

Hinata analysed the signature, and sure enough, it seemed too flowery, like someone was putting too much effort into the signature, lots of loops and flowery embellishes, rather than a working man's scrawl, the kind of signature that was repeated over and over.

His eyes lazily lolled in their sockets. "It's not substantial, but you might be onto something. It looks dodgy."

"It could be the tip of the iceberg."

Sasuke shrugged. "Could is the operative term," his eyes flickered with something unsaid, the dark storm of his pupils becoming a hurricane of unsaid thoughts, the waters of his eyes running still in contemplation. He gave the file back blithely, as if the bundle of papers was of little importance.

Hinata flicked to the pages he had been resting on, and read over the blocks of text that had escaped her notice, hidden, in this maze of text, were the keys to her faceless enemies undoing—there must be unknown legalities, kooky exchanges of money, unauthorised missions and a large number of missing persons associated, however loosely, with ROOT, and if Hinata could infiltrate the organisation's Achilles heel, then presumably her revenge could be made a lot easier.

"What did Kabuto say to you?"

Hinata broke out of her reverie. "He said to talk to you when I wanted out."

Sasuke made motions to start training, setting up a target board for simple kunai training "Oh," he said. "He wants me to kill you then."

"O-oh," Hinata made a low, keening noise from the back of her throat.

"Just wander around the base until Orochimaru has his first treatment, like you're stocking up for your travels, taking advantage of the shinobi stock system before you leave. The clever ones always do that before they attempt leaving, and Kabuto won't bat an eyelid if you're pigging yourself out in the cafeteria."

Hinata shook her head from side to side, weighing up the plan. It seemed feasible, but she didn't like the fact she had to trust the Uchiha so explicitly, especially as he was supposed to play executioner.

She brushed a loose stand of hair behind her ear, thinking quickly, just to ensure that she was of use to Sasuke, so he wouldn't consider an attempt on her life during the tension-ridden few days before he took on Orochimaru, to relieve suspicion. "Is there anything I could do in way of helping you with Orochimaru?"she asked, quickly.

Sasuke clicked his tongue, and shook his head. "I want to take him on my own."

He didn't want to elaborate. Hinata understood totally, and didn't really want to get into such a conflict—she had no ambition to ever get in a fight with a Sannin, ill or not.

"I want to release the prisoners and experiments. It'll distract the Oto shinobi and Kabuto. You'll have enough time to really make him pay," Hinata suggested. Sasuke's ears practically perked up.

"How on earth do you propose to do that?" Sasuke snorted, like it was impossible.

"Explosives. I've experimented in the past with explosives—taking the chemicals out of explosive tags and the likewise and disguising them in solvents, paints, plaster, that sort of thing. It'll come in handy. I've been looking around in here at the concrete foundations—and sneaking around in the complex itself. There's a fair few places I could place explosives to a deadly effect. Boom," she clapped her hands.

"Boom," echoed Sasuke, raising a thoughtful finger up to his chin. "Just make sure that you don't set the explosives off in a position that would shorten my time with our favourite Sannin."

Hinata raised her hands in a mock surrender. "I'll try my best. The compound is riddled with faults, and they do cross over, but I should be able to navigate the lines and cause ruptures in other areas. My eyes help."

Sasuke nodded, placated with her planning. "Thursday it is."

* * *

><p>She said an indirect goodbye to Karin, just to assess her reactions, just to address a knawing curiosity. The tension tore her thin, and she needed a break from planning where to place the tags. And it was always interesting to gauge other's emotions, to test whether a person is lying, or whether they tell a white lie, or if their emotions are as blank and void as a shinobi is supposed to be. Her family had been destroyed before she learnt the family secrets as to reading the mind through sight, but sometimes, Hinata wonders if she has acquired it through sweat and hard work.<p>

When you live like filth, with filth, you get used to lying tics very, very quickly. It's the honest, salt-of-the earth persona's that really start to confuse her, the kind that blind her with honest smiles and talk kindly, even though she knows fully well that a good person like that, should never be talking to her.

Karin's face is smooth like any shinobi's should be, a few flickers perhaps, surprise, sorrow, an instinct to bite the lip which is promptly disengaged, a slow blinking.

"But don't you want to stay here? It's good here, it's much harder on the outside," there's a tone that's more than conversational, an edge of desperation. She knows what happens to people who try to leave.

Hinata shakes her head and smiles limpidly. "I've got a sister on the outside. I want to find her. Or put her to rest."

It's a good story, and it's worth re-using.

This time Karin does bite her lip. "Oh, I'm sorry to hear that," she says, robotically spewing out the words with a mere iota of sympathy.

Hinata repeated the smile. "It's okay," a silence reigns, and all are soaked. Hinata shivered, the quiet creeping into the marrow of her bones, seeping through her system like a poison. "I'll head out to Konoha, scout around there. Maybe I'll find something up there."

"Take care," Karin croaks, not meeting her eyes, legs shifting over each other, uncomfortably, like the heat is getting to her.

"Aa-and you, Karin!" Hinata smiles, and wonders if she is a sadist.

* * *

><p>It's hardly delicate work. When trailing the expanse of the compound, following cracks and fissures whilst meditating in the training room, byuakugan activated to the chakra equivalent of a shimmer to prevent burn-out. She had expected the cracks to be similar to gossamer threads—delicate and tiny and simple to manipulate. But the compound is old, and all hodge-podge in design. Orochimaru has added to the cracked old foundations, built where others before haven't, and Orochimaru was not the first to build upon what looks to be a very ancient complex.<p>

But Hinata is no archaeologist, despite being the human equivalent of an x-ray machine, it's the mechanics of the building that she's more interested in, if she places this amount here, what will be affected? Will the entire roof fall in, or will nothing happen—or even worse, would it create a domino effect, where everything falls to the ground, and Sasuke's time with Orochimaru would be rudely interrupted?

Cracks gape like screaming mouths, fissures split into the seams of the earth, pillars that should be purely ornamental carry the weight of vaulted roofs. There's no doubt that should there be a sizable explosion, the compound will disassemble. It's the placing that is truly intricate, and Hinata is as much as a mathematician as she is an archaeologist.

She reasons that a series of implosive charges—little packets of explosive material connected to a fuse, disguised as patches of plaster, as if that particular wall is to be refurnished. To fool a compound of ninja, the best thing to do is to hide behind the principle of looking underneath the underneath, to barely conceal beneath a shoddy piece of workmanship. It's not rare to see nin-summons scurrying around doing odd jobs, so she soon has Shibo waddling around with a plastering kit between his frowning jowls, and explosives hidden beneath the beneath, a simple adhesive sticking them to his stomach in a cute little gen-jutsu a gennin could cook up.

It just makes him look even fatter, and his stomach now wobbled dangerously with every step. Sasuke was not impressed, preferring a more striking approach.

"Look, it's simple, it works, it doesn't need to be fancy," she snarls at Sasuke on Wednesday, nerves striking her suddenly when he makes yet another derogatory statement. She was sure he shared the same emotions, writhing under the porcelain surface, but he never showed it, and to an extent, it pissed Hinata off, because every time she made any kind of come-back, he harrumphed and sent a look to her that would send the leviathan back to the depths, blushing red with shame like she did, mumbling something incomprehensive about blast caps, or the intricacy of a chemical explosion. Rate equations, kc values. Equilibrium. Chemistryfuckshite words.

Admittedly it's a little out of her normal chemical range, but she knows enough about the varieties of explosive to make some paltry dynamite siphoned from explosive tags and a few tricks she keeps up her sleeves.

But she's still unsure. There's little in the planning department. She provides distractions, exploding the compound whilst she's still inside, and Sasuke has a one-to-one fight with Orochimaru.

"How will we find each other if everything goes your way?" she muses out loud, one of the many issues that she has with Sasuke's plot making itself heard.

Sasuke actually considers the comment, and she is surprised even further when he wanders over to her, pulling out a kunai, and in one lithe action, ringing a thin slit around the whole of his wrist, enough to bleed, but not enough to slit the arteries. He motioned for her hand, which she gave willingly, wincing as he drew the same line around her wrist.

He then positioned her hand so it faced upwards, taking his first and second finger and placing them on top of her pulse point, angling his hand so she echoed his action in reverse, her fingers placed lightly on his pulse point, his hand facing downward, hers facing upward.

The contact was quick, business like, mandatory but accurate, but the warmth that pooled from his hands surprised Hinata. There is no doubt in Hinata's head that Sasuke is a cold person. The very stereotype of the cool and cold trope. It only makes sense to her that liquid ice should run through his veins, it's just in keeping. The discovery that Uchiha Sasuke is very much human, or at least mammal in origin, and gives off body heat like most other living creatures is almost disheartening.

"Echo this."

He sends forth a signature of his chakra into her system, the blood acting as a conductor. It feels like she has placed an elastic band around her wrist that grows tighter and tighter until his chakra finally merges into her own system, aggressive and noncompliant, buzzing up her arm like a swarm of bees dispersing into her veins, giving her pins-and -needles. She inflicted a similar pulse on him, and was gratified to see his skin crawl with gooseflesh.

She wondered if he shared the same sensation as she did, or if her chakra in his system is more sinister, more used to dismantling a body from the inside to out.

Nonetheless, she feels a sudden connection, an exchange of heat in her body that isn't generated from her, the rolling beat of another pulse, a flicker of chakra usage.

"It'll run out after two weeks," he murmured, biting the corner of his lip as if uncomfortable with her life-beat ringing in his ears. He turned away almost too quickly. "It gets heavier the closer you are. The further away, the lighter the beat. Just feel that, and use your byuakugan, and you'll find me, for better or for worse."

He shifted on his heels and cast a short curt glance over his shoulder. "You should get some sleep. Tomorrow is a big day."

She begrudged him a nod and wandered to her rooms, summoning Shibo to her side and ghosting through the compound's corridors like a demon, the ferret resting around her neck like a protective shield. Sasuke's words, and Sasuke's lazy heart beat rolled through her body, in an awkward tandem with her own.

* * *

><p>She woke with a shock, a tremor running through her body, forcing her to arch with the spasm, realising that something was happening somewhere, then remembering that she was joined with Sasuke, and that she had felt something of his.<p>

It was weirdly intimate, a feeling of a slight echo within her skin, lacing the pathways of her body in osculating tempo. It took a slow, long minute to realise, and a longer eternity to _feel_ the delicate shifts of the alien energy within her, realising that he was fighting, expending chakra, her chakra mimicking his. She activated her byuakugan and watched as her chakra sluggishly moved into essential expulsion points, like she has going to use the chakra for a jutsu. Her chakra was being pulled by the amount Sasuke had inserted into hers. If she employed a jutsu now, she wondered, would interfere with his own system?

She averted her eyes, and looked to the cheap alarm clock, reading that it was four o'clock in the morning. She swore, waking up the ferret lying on her stomach. She could feel Sasuke now, his pulse beating fast, his body expending large amounts of chakra. Her temperature dropped.

The link allowed him to dip into her reserves. He was already doing so, skimming tiny amounts to stabilise jutsu, playing a cosy little balancing act to make his jutsu more effective, whatever they may be. She bit back a frown. "Shibo, the cafeteria," she hissed, uncomfortable with the chakra dispersing from her reserves, with the new, alien chakra appearing in her system, like a toxin in her bloodstream that disagreed with her. She felt uncomfortable, her body felt unpredictable.

The ferret blinked, his beady little eyes sparkling like the backs of black beetles before vanishing away in a little smog.

No one ought to be in the cafeteria at this time. It would start the evacuation.

She stretched, instantly missing the absence of Shibo's warmth, letting the mattress squeak in protest as she pressed into it, softly springing up and picking up her satchel full of her things, with the ROOT file and her priceless almanac inside, slamming her leather jacket over her bed-clothes. It was almost like having a slight headache or muscle strain; small, repetitive action made her forget the shifting of her chakras without her permission. But worry wormed through her mind, obscuring any concern she had for the fluctuations of chakra.

It was too early. She was certain of that. Sasuke was deviating wildly from the plan, and presumably, that shock that had been sent through to her was to wake her up, to get the explosives coming, to start the game plan.

The floor rumbled beneath her feet, the explosion causing the compound to shake. From a distance she could hear the scream of metal, rocks crumbling, disintegrating with a great howl, the start of the game.

And now the players were up.

Shibo popped out of non-existence and coiled around her neck, and met her eyes. The noise rumbled to a still.

"Now all of them. You are dismissed after this. Get out of here, fatty," she whispered to the ferret perched on her shoulder, placing a kiss on the end of his little pink nose, and sticking a little bit of sweet dango that she had taken from the cafeteria between his drooling jaws.

The ferret offered her a waspish smile and disappeared once more, dango gulped down. She took one, quick breath, cast a good look around the room to ensure there was nothing of value left, and made out of the door, meeting the majority of the inhabitants of the corridor outside, individual weapons at hand.

"Kin, what was that?" she asked the dark haired woman in lime green yoga pants, who had already raised a senbon needle, the panic in her voice amplified.

The woman threw an annoyed look at Hinata, the kind of look that an annoyed superior gives when faced with incompetent subordinates. "How the fuck should I know?"

"No need to be so hasty," growled a bandaged man, who stooped at the knees. "This compound is old. Maybe something has collapsed."

Kin bit back a retort and glanced around. "We should evacuate the gennin. They're in the south dorms, right?"

"Can I help?" mewed Hinata, raising a helpful hand.

"Probably not, you couldn't even find the showers on your own," scowled Kin with tenacity, turning away to argue with her team-members.

The floor rumbled beneath their feet again, further away, but with greater conviction, the ceiling dropping plaster on their heads.

"We're under attack," the man announced, pulling out a kunai, bandages creasing above his frown, his feet easing into a balanced stance. "Kin, take the south, with Zaku, kill the enemy. Jounin and over, we need to ensure the security of Orochimaru's experiments. Come with me. I want the chuunins on this level to evacuate the gennin. Go."

Hinata made to follow the chunin, the floor now noticeably shaking a little more than she had anticipated. Another explosion went off, this time shaking the floor even more, so much so that she nearly fell over, and had to grasp the handle of the closest door, her eyes crusted with white powder.

A long shaking scream radiated down the corridor, chakra radiating like a flood, making it hard to breathe.

The lights flickered, and died, and for what seemed like an eternity, where the sounds of Hinata's body did not feel like her own—Sasuke's alien adrenaline tampered with her system. Her breath was quicker than anticipated, but so was the breathing of the other shinobi surrounding her. Eventually, a back-up reservoir of electricity kicked in, and pale, energy saving strip lights flashed on, revealing the shinobi to one another once more, dousing the corridor in a green, eerie light.

"Fuck." the man who had taken order swore, his one eye a darkened hollow. "They're out…Fuck the gennin. The priority is to ensure that none of those abominations gets out. We can't let them get out into the village.

The scream continued, and the bandaged man legged it down the corridor, followed by his teammates and the majority of the corridor, leaving Hinata and a few pale looking gennin.

She spun to the group of six, seven pale faced children. "Where are the dorms?"

"To the east, past the cafeteria," squealed a pasty looking girl with brown eyes.

"We'll evac, don't worry, I'm chuunin," she shouted, waving them onwards as they scurried towards their teammates, panic making their senses sharp, and their pace faster, relieved that they were being looked after by a big girl.

It wasn't soon before they were met with a collapsed ceiling, which Hinata circumnavigated by using a few short-cuts and blasting through a few non-essential walls. The gennin duly impressed.

The floor shook again, so violently that a gennin was flung to the floor .Hinata realised that she had started an earthquake, the exposed seam that ran underneath the compound was faltering. She hadn't considered the full geographical ramifications. Sasuke, buried in the bowels of the complex, could be compromised.

She swore under her breath and Sasuke seemed to reply by sucking a noticeable portion of her chakra from her body, leaving her legs feeling like lumps of jelly, stumbling over her feet so much that the gormless gennin looked at her in a worry.

She flicked a thumb up, smiling like an idiot, entering the gennin dorms, finding a few more to add to her collection, children that looked too small to be soldiers, too bony and too weak. But she did not comment, she, after all, had started learning kata from the day she could walk, and that was far, far younger than the children that milled around her now in a panic mob, their only beacon of hope in a village that had forgotten their existence.

It wasn't as if they had been treated badly. It was a homely dorm; there were drawings on the walls and toy weapons, even though the walls were a mustard green, and cracked. She had no doubt they were looked after. They were, after all, the next generation of minions, some may display talent, go on to become Jounin. Orochimaru knew how to breed loyalty.

She snapped to attention. "Pair up, and we'll leave. Oldest and youngest! Does anyone know where the exit is? You're close to the top here!"

A stout boy of about twelve raised his hand.

"Lead," the imperative had hardly left her mouth when she felt a watery loop around her ankle pull her down, through the concrete floor. She fell, into a vast abyss, the force, whatever it was, around her ankle, dissipating, letting her free fall. She landed in a crouch position, just bundling her legs together in time, having to expel more chakra than she wanted too. Almost instantly, she pulled out a tainted blade, and waited for an attack to come.

It never did.

The hall she was in glowed a ghastly green, throwing odd shadows around the sparse surroundings. She could only see pools of what looked to be water—but green water, and glowing softly and ringing slightly with a soft trill. She looked around her, and for as far as she could see, these pools of strange colour surrounded her, each allocated their own space, wiring linking the pools to one another, meshed with larger tubing, linking up to machines doted almost randomly around the huge hall, the mechanical humming similar to the hush of a cathedral.

"Don't dither around! Get me out you bitch!" shouted a voice.

She blinked, and activated her byuakugan, searching desperately for the origin of the voice. She could make out the tiny faces of the Sound children from what seemed to be a pin-prick of light high, up above, but she could not detect the person calling to her.

"Sasuke did say you were a twit," the voice growled. Hinata blinked. And looked at the pool directly in front of her. Which was talking to her.

She blinked again.

"I don't appreciate negative comments from pools of foul smelling substances, thank you very much," commented Hinata, feeling incredibly light headed. She began to search for the point of concussion, deciding the best she could do was to apply Witch-hazel solution, or an antiseptic. And find a medic.

"It's mildew, you bint."

"It's smells horrible," Hinata sniffed, deciding to humour her delusions. "Oh, you said something about Sasuke."

Perhaps her masochistic sub-conscious could shed some light on Sasuke.

"Sasuke said you were to release me from this underwater tomb, me 'lady,'" she couldn't help but feel like the pond was taunting her. She couldn't find any place of contact, and she didn't hurt, and she supposed that had she hit her head, she would know about it. So she presumed that she was talking to a real, live, talking volume of water. It wasn't a huge conclusion to jump to. There were weirder and wilder things in the world, and considering she was in one of Orochimaru's labs, this was probably tame by comparison of the other things she could have fallen into.

"How do I know if you are lying, you stagnant puddle?"

"Oh God. I'm going to die in here. FUCK," swore the pond.

"Oh God, I'm going to die in here, stuck talking to a pond with Tourette's syndrome'," wailed Hinata, forgetting herself and checking her head for the bruise or puncture again. The first hypothesis made much more sense than a talking puddle.

"Touché, but I know the way out."

"You're a pond," deadpanned Hinata, still searching for the point where she hit her head and caused the concussion. "How do you even talk?"

"I pulled you down didn't I?"

"You're a self- aware pond, with some self-control. This doesn't change much," Hinata harrumphed, scowling over the point of logic the glowing pond had just scored.

"I'm a bloke!"

"I presumed ponds were hermaphrodites. Each to their own I suppose. Before today I had never even realised that ponds had an autonomy, let alone a specific gender. After all, what makes a person a gender, should they be, indeed, as in your case, without the physiology to form a gender?"

"Shut the fuck up! I'm a guy, a human, trapped here!"

"Pull the other one."

A rumble was heard, a long distance away, and Sasuke pulled yet more chakra out of her at an alarming rate, but Hinata had become accustomed to that, and wasn't so desperate. Hinata released a sigh. "Look, subconscious or magical pool, can you tell me the way out? I would really appreciate it."

"I'll get you out. You just need to release me."

"How do I do that, and how do I know I can trust you? Why shouldn't I just walk away?"

"I'm a generally nice guy, okay," replied the pond smarmily.

"And so is Orochimaru."

"Don't compare me to that twat! Look, I'm just a test subject, let me out! I don't want to be buried!"

The ground reverberated once more, and Hinata caught the scent of smoke, of burning. Somewhere, the compound was on fire. Admittedly, the pond did appeal to Hinata's sense of fair play and empathy, and it only seemed fair that if she was going to release the other abominations of Orochimaru, then maybe one more to the mix wouldn't hurt, especially if it was indebted to her.

"How do I get you out?"

"Just dip a flinger or something into the water, push and break the seal."

"Can't you do it yourself? You did get me down here."

"I have been in here for quite some time. I just stretched the seal. Alright? It's something Sasuke's worked on."

Hinata rolled her eyes and rolled up her sleeves, holding a kunai in one hand, just in case the pond…attacked. It had managed to break through the concrete flooring in order to get to her, so there was a high probability it could do something nasty, though Hinata supposed that it would have killed her already if it had wanted to.

She placed her hand on the surface of the green water, surprised that there was a solid resistance against her, so much so that she had to press her entire body weight on the hand.

"Oh yeah baby. Like that," the pond cooed, the jelly like surface writhing beneath her.

Hinata had neither the time to recoil or to retort from the ponds lecherous sweet-talk before the pond surface ruptured beneath her weight and she fell through, into the icy water. It was almost as if a whirlpool of water span past her, spraying her with mildew scented substances as she fell into the pond.

She spat out some of the foul water and hoisted herself out of the pond, her hands meeting a pair of pale feet.

She looked up to sight a pale faced boy smirking at her from above, naked as the day he was born, hands on his hips, head cocked to the side.

"That was awesome."

"H-huh?" she squeaked, face boiling over into redness, realising that the pond was indeed a young man. Very obviously a man. Not genderless at all.

"You're wet,"

"…Yes. I am."

The young man's face broke into a shit-eating grin, full of sharp teeth. Hinata didn't know how to react, so she winced and frowned at the same time, heaving herself out of the pool. Her plant samples would be ruined, the vials fine, but the samples of useful leaves would have to be collected over.

She took another glance at the naked man, then turned and proffered her old, blood-stained jacket to him from her bag.

"Make yourself decent," she whimpered, turning away.

When she turned around again, he had fashioned her old purple jacket into a skirt and was still wearing that same freakish smile. The effect was ruined by the ghastly green shadows being cast on the young man's face, the young man's huge sharpened teeth, and his blanched white hair tainted green in the light.

"Name's Suigetsu. You're not one of Orochimaru's bitches, are you? You're like, Sasuke's chick?"

"…No? Yes? I'm not sure." She had played Orochimaru's… bitch for the last… three, four months, but she wasn't a bitch in other terminology (ie, Sasuke's capacity), and she was associated with Sasuke, but calling her a chick? She wasn't quite that intimate with the Uchiha.

He waved her away. "It's cool. We need to get out of here. I need my effects"

Hinata faltered, the floor shook, a scream was heard from above. "We do, really, really need to get out," she suggested.

"Just my sword."

Suigestu ignored her comments and made his way to a chest by the side of the wall, pulling out a large sword, though Hinata could vouch that he wasn't compensating.

Hinata mumbled something that even she wasn't sure of and strode towards the first exit she saw.

And then she got the innuendo.

* * *

><p>She loped alongside the white haired male, who had introduced himself as Suigetsu, and proceeded to show off his water abilities, exemplifying his ability to scout and avoid any other residents of the dungeons they were in, even showing her a useful escape staircase. He carried the air of a false, blasé aggressiveness, like he was toying with her, or rather, approaching the world with timidity, facing it with a false front.<p>

He was also surprisingly talkative, considering they were both sprinting through a building that was literally falling to pieces around them. She wondered how he could talk, let alone navigate in semi-darkness with dust falling all around them.

Through conversation, she had observed that he had been captured at the age of fourteen, and that he was twenty now, a full year older than herself. He seemed interested in the world outside. To him, she supposed, she must seem like a great adventurer, sashaying from Suna to the Frost counties. Or at least, a fairly reliable source of information. She was just giving the notion a romantic feel. It was pleasant to spill her guts to someone who had a real interest, somebody who was curious enough about the outer world to want to hear her musings on the schisms of Suna society, how ugly the cloud citadel building were, yet how beautiful the interiors were.

He originated from Kiri, and had travelled, often to similar places as Hinata had when she had travelled with her traveling caravan in the east. He had an older brother to avenge. Seven men who had done him wrong, seven swords to be robbed from dead bodies.

"It sounds like a story to be told in great epics," she gasped, sprinting down a tiled hall, her steps light and lady like to avoid tiles that jutted out from the floor like a scales on a great lizard's back.

Suigetsu grinned, leaping over a fallen rafter.

Several more meters were covered.

"How d-do you know Sasuke?"

She averted her eyes away from how dangerously her jacket flapped around Suigetsu's waist.

"We trained. Not extensively. I was pulled out when the experiments thinned out. They used to put me in a pressurised tube then, and it was easy then. Then they permanently liquidised me and stuck me in a seal. Waiting until I became useful again, taking small samples whenever. Sasuke used to come to talk. Think he liked to remind himself that there were people in a worse position than him. Didn't gloat or anything. Sometimes sat in silence, or through me, swearing at him, or discussing strategies. Manly shit."

"Oh—what did he say about me?"

The two ran up a cylindrical stairway that seemed to go on forever, the spiral so thin and tight, and the steps so steep, that Suigetsu did not answer until they had reached the top.

"Oh. He mentioned you last week, but he'd been more than a little absent. The time before I had accused him of hooking up with one of those sound kunochi, and he became all defensive," Suigetsu released a small bark of laughter. "Then last night he tells me that he has a bet with me. If I can, with some of my morphic ability , and a little weakening on my bounds, drag you down to my deepest pit of hell, you would probably release me. I won."

"Oh," she answered, dodging a collapsing wall wall.

"He gave me a pulse of your chakra and everything, so I could feel your movements when you came close. Sasuke's a maniac, you know. Guess he wanted us out alive. Do you know what the maniac wants from us? Are we going to be his minions? I am not going to be an underling. Just sayin.'"

"I've got a stake in this too," Hinata admitted. "He wants to take out the people who wronged his clan. The same happened to my family; our motives are twinned."

"His psycho brother killed everyone, right? That's what I heard."

"The rabbit-hole is deeper than that," stated Hinata grimly. "O-or so I think. I think Sasuke's so used to viewing the situation from one perspective he is having trouble adjusting to a larger picture."

"Don't talk in allegories," Suigetsu growled from a couple of meters in front of her, his words weakened by the wind whistling holes in his short, sharp statements, so that they lost their intended effect. "Speak clearly. Don't mince your words. A wasted word can do more damage than a bomb."

Hinata decided not to comment on how hard it was for her to speak, let alone make short concise statements without wavering, or starting to waffle. But she was distracted by a beam of thin light though the dust, sunlight, catching particles in a pure stream of light.

She skidded to a stop, hypnotised by the promise of the golden light upon her forehead, ignoring the debris around her feet.

Without provocation, Suigetsu punched through the ceiling, sending debris down on the both of them, scrambling through the hole like a convict. Hinata followed after, entering into a valley of rice paddies, clear of both buildings and trees.

The sky dripped grey like a lazy watercolour, bland clouds rolling ominously on the horizon, pealing with the kind of angry darkness that forecast a severe storm to come. A chafing wind ran through her hair, raking her nostrils with the stench of burning and doubling over her stomach when she smelt the scent of burning flesh, only realising now that it was that smell that had coated the walls of her escape from the Hyuuga household as a child.

The storm clouds riled, and in the distance her eagle eyes caught sight of a lightning bolt dash down to the earth, like the Gods reaching into the world just for one moment. The lightning ceased, but the roar of thunder pealed down the valley, a crescendo echoing around her, enhanced by the acoustics of the valley. A single bird took flight, fleeing from the terrifying noise, it's iridescent black feathers, so black they were almost green, clashing with white sections of the bird's body.

A magpie.

A childhood song, one that she had learnt in the academy floated across her mind like oil over water, clogging her thoughts until her mind was preoccupied with the song, or rather, particularly, the first line, repeating again and again.

_One for sorrow._

She wasn't one for superstition, nor religion or ghosts, but as the bird fluttered off, and the lightning in the distance sparked once more, searing the surface of the earth, Hinata felt very, very small, and the sense she had—the instinctive premonition she had always possessed, twisted inside of her, flinching, like in fright.

Hinata couldn't help but feel that something wicked was on the horizon.

She wondered if Sasuke could feel it, too.

* * *

><p><strong>Author's Note<strong>

****Exams are over, and I've finally updated! This is cause for celebration, me'thinks. Anyhow, it's a decent, long chapter, quite wordy in places, but that's to settle down later plot points. I also wanted to hit different moods in this chapter, you know, a little bit of comedy, a little bit of a sobering thought, and a little bit of intrigue. Sooner or later, I will combat Sasuhina, and I intend to do this realistically, no confessions of love or unreasonable character moments, and a fair amount of psychological nastiness thrown in for good account. Sasuke's more fun to write when he's not all there.

Thanks for reading ;)


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